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SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT 
AND LABOR 



BY 

ROBERT FRANKLIN HOXIE 

ASSOCIATE PROFESSOB OF POLITICAL ECONOMY, UNIVEBSITT OF CHICAGO; 

SPECIAL INVESTIGATOR OP SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT FOR THE 

UNITED STATES COMMISSION ON INDCSTBIAL RELATIONS 




D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 

NEW YORK AND LONDON 

1915 



1 / 



^^9 

^^>^ 



\^ki\^y 



COPTHIGHT, 1915, BY 

D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 



Printed in tlie United States of America 

NOV II 1915 ■ 



iCI,A416331 "1^ 



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PREFACE 

The book here presented is based upon an investigation 
of scientific management in its relations to labor, made by 
the writer for the United States Commission on Industrial 
Relations. The in vestiga tion involved a study of scientific 
management shops designated, in the main, by Mr. Fred- 
erick W. Taylor, Mr. H. L. Gantt and Mr. Harrington \ 
Emerson, leaders of the movement. In this shop study, the 
investigator was assisted by Mr. Robert G. Valentine, In- 
dustrial Counselor, appointed by the Commission to repre- 
sent employing management, and Mr. John P. Frey, Editor 
of the "International Molders' Journal," similarly appointed 
to represent labor. Both Mr. Valentine and Mr. Frey were 
in close touch with the writer during the course of the 
investigation and the preparation of the report to the Com- 
mission, and both attached their signatures to that docu- 
ment as well as to the conclusions which were presented 
with it.^ This monograph has also received their unqual- 
ified approval. 

The discussion which follows is for the most part an 
attempt to test Mr. Taylor's claims respecting scientific 
management in its relations to labor, the claims of Mr. 1 
Gantt and Mr. Emerson being considered only in so far as \ 
they differ from those of Mr. Taylor. Justification for this | 
mode of procedure is clearly set forth in the text.^ It was 
found impossible, however, in comparing the claims with 
the facts revealed by the investigation, to make any con- 
sistent attempt to differentiate the conditions found in so- 
called Taylor, Gantt and Emerson shops, partly because of 

^ See Appendix I. 
^ See p. 8. 



vi PREFACE 

the limited time allowed for the work, but also because of 
the overlapping of influences and systems in practice. The 
writer, however, has been careful to exclude evidence from 
the unsystematized portions of shops, and from those in 
which the process of systematization has not had time as 
yet to produce characteristic results. 

In making this study the writer has had no desire to 
uphold or to condemn scientific management or either party 
to the controversy concerning it. He has tried simply to 
discover and to set forth the facts and the truth, in the 
hope of dispelling misconceptions and misunderstandings, 
that a basis may be found for constructive effort in the 
interests of all concerned. He has endeavored thus to em- \ 
phasize in turn the possible benefits of scientific manage- | 
ment, its actual results thus far in practice, together with ' 
their causes, and its fundamental relations to labor welfare. 
This mode of treatment may give to particular portions of 
the study an air of partisanship. Fair conclusions, there- 
fore, are to be based only on the study as a whole, and the 
unbiased reader will reserve judgments to the end. 

The present need has seemed to be for a clear-cut and 
concise treatment of the main points at issue between scien- 
tific managers and organized labor. What is here presented, 
therefore, is by no means a complete consideration of all 
the important phases of the subject. . Some vital matters 
have been discussed very briefly and one very important 
topic — unfounded and unproved trade union charges against 
scientific management — has been omitted altogether. In a 
later study the writer hopes to discuss all aspects of the 
subject fully and to present the specific evidence which is 
necessarily omitted here as well as to differentiate as far as 
possible the results found in Taylor, Gantt and Emerson 
shops. It is to be noted, however, that the appendices to 
this volume contain a full statement of the vital points at 
issue between scientific managers and organized labor, as 
well as an analysis of the fundamental and specific informa- 
tion necessary for an examination and test of labor condi- 



PREFACE vii 

tions, tendencies and effects in scientific management shops. 

Most cordial thanks are due to Mr. Frederick W. Taylor, 
Mr. H. L. Gantt, Mr. Harrington Emerson, Mr. Carl G. 
Barth, and many other scientific management leaders, ex- 
perts and shop officials, for willing and unstinted assistance 
in the prosecution of the investigation. The investigators 
were almost everywhere received with uniform courtesy, 
every opportunity for direct and thorough study was af- 
forded, and all possible assistance was given them through- 
out. In addition, the managements of many shops devoted 
weeks and sometimes months to the careful preparation of 
answers to the printed questionnaire on which the investi- 
gation was primarily based. 

The writer is under special obligations to Mr. H. K. 
Hathaway and Mr. A. E. Barter, who personally assisted in 
the study of some of the most important shops ; to Pro- 
fessor L. C. Marshall, who thoroughly criticized the report 
to the Commission, and has collaborated in its revision, and 
to E. Andrews Swift on whose indefatigable cooperation 
and counsel the writer has depended throughout the investi- 
gation. Acknowledgment is made elsewhere of the obliga- 
tions under which the writer rests to the official experts 
appointed by the Commission. 

Chicago, 
September i, 1915. 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT 
AND LABOR 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT 
AND LABOR 



CONTENTS 

PART I 
VIEWPOINT AND METHOD 

PAGE 

1. The Genesis and Nature of the Investiga- 

tion I 

2. The Claims of Scientific Management Rela- 

tive TO Labor 7 

3. The Trade Union Objections to Scientific 

Management 13 

PART II 

CRITICAL EXAMINATION OF SCIENTIFIC MANAGE- 
MENT IN ITS RELATIONS TO LABOR 

A. Possible Benefits of Scientific Management to 

Labor and to Society 20 

B. Scientific Management in Practice 

1. Introduction 25 

2. The General Order and Completeness of Instal- 

lation Q.'J 

3. Functional Foremanship 31 

4. The Methods Employed in the Selection and Hir- 

ing of Workmen -31 

5. The Character, Extent and Results of Attempts 

at Adaptation, Instruction and Training of 

the Workers 34 

6. Time Study and Task Setting: Their Purposes, 

Methods and Results 39 

ix 



X . CONTENTS 

PAGE 

7. Rate Making, Modes of Payment and the Main- 

tenance of Rates 61 

8. The Protection of Workers from Over-exertion 

and Exhaustion 87 

9. Opportunities for Advancement and Promotion . 92 

10. The Modes of Discipline 95 

11. Methods of Discharge and the Length of Service 96 

12. Scientific Management and Industrial Democracy 98 

13. Causes of the Shortcomings of Scientific Man- 

agement in Practice 113 

C. Scientific Management and Labor Welfare . . 123 
Modern Industry and Craft Skill. 

APPENDICES 

I. Conclusions Resulting from the Investigation 137/ 

II. The Labor Claims of Scientific Management 

According to Mr. Frederick W. Taylor . 140 

III. The Labor Claims of Scientific Management 

According to Mr. H. L. Gantt . . . 150 

IV. The Labor Claims of Scientific Management 

According to Harrington Emerson . . 152 

V. The Trade Union Objections to Scientific 

Management 169 

VI. Vital Points at Issue Between Scientific 
Management and Labor Based Upon the 
Labor Claims of Scientific Managers . 178 

VII. Vital Points at Issue Between Scientific 
Management and Labor Based Upon the 
Trade Union Objections to Scientific 

Management 187 

• 

VIII. Questionnaire: Scientific Management and 

Labor 196 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT 
AND LABOR 

PART I 
VIEWPOINT AND METHOD 

I. The Genesis and Nature of the Investigation 

The present study was the result primarily of hear- 
ings on scientific management held by the United States 
Commission on Industrial Relations, in April, 19 14. At 
these hearings, it developed that the representatives of or- 
ganized labor stand in almost unqualified opposition to what 
they regard as scientific management, and that the claims 
and counterclaims put forward by scientific management 
and labor leaders are far-reaching and apparently in irrec- 
oncilable conflict. It was primarily to test the validity of 
these opposing claims, and to determine what, if anythingl 
can be done to harmonize the relations of scientific man! 
agement and labor, and to protect and promote the welfare 
of all concerned, that the investigation was undertaken. 

The general scope of the study was naturally determined 
by the character of the opposing groups. "Organized 
labor," declared the committee especially appointed to rep- 
resent the attitu de of the Americ an FederatiQiLof_Xabpr inl 
this connection, "understands by the term 'scientific manage-/ 
ment' certain well-defined 'efiiciency systems' which hava 
been recently devised by individuals and small groups under 
the leadership or in imitation of men like Frederick W. 
Taylor, H. L. Gantt, and Harrington Emerson, by whom 
this term has been preempted. ... Its objections are di- 



2 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

reeled solely against systems of the so-called 'scientific 
management' cult." In view of this statement and the 
limited time for the work in hand, it seemed best to con- 
fine the study mainly to the systems of scientific manage- 
ment named above, and their variations, and, in order that 
it should be fair in all respects to these systems and their 
representatives, Mr, Taylor, Mr. Gantt, and Mr. Emer- 
son were requested to designate the shops to be investi- 
gated. This was done, and with a few special exceptions, 
the study was limited to shops so named. 

In preparation for the work of actual investigation, a 
study was made of scientific management as presented by 
its leading advocates, and the controversial literature was 
carefully examined in order to determine the exact char- 
acter of its labor claims and the charges made by organ- 
ized labor against it. The books, papers, and pamphlets, 
the hearings and government reports bearing on the 
subject were read, and representatives on both sides of 
the controversy consulted. On the basis of this careful 
study, two preliminary statements were prepared, pre- 
senting, respectively, the "Labor Claims of the Scientific 
Managers" and the "Trade Union Objections to Scientific 
Management." The first of these statements was sub- 
mitted successively to Mr. Taylor, Mr. Gantt, and Mr. 
Emerson, for revision and approval ; the second was modi- 
fied and approved by a committee appointed by the Execu- 
tive Council of the American Federation of Labor, and 
by the chief officers of that organization. From these 
official documents, the writer was able to determine with 
assurance the vital points at issue ^ between the contesting 
parties, and, in view of these, to draw up a questionnaire 
covering the information needed to determine the truth in 
regard to them.^ 

In the meantime, an extended search was made for ex- 
perts acceptable to each side to accompany the investigator 

^ See Appendices VI and VII. 
' See Appendix VIII. 



GENESIS AND NATURE OF INVESTIGATION 3 

in the examination of shops, and to insure the fairness and 
thoroughness of the study. He was signally fortunate in 
securing thus the appointment and services of Mr. Robert 
G. Valentine, Industrial Counselor, of Boston, to represent 
employing management, and Mr. John P. Frey, of Cincin- 
nati, Editor of the International Holders' Journal, to rep- 
resent the interests of labor. 

The investigation of shops was begun early in January, 
191 5, and with some interruptions, continued to the last of 
April, 1915. Thirty-five shops and systematizin g concerns V 
were examined, and inferviews w-erehad with many promi- 
nent scientific management leaders, experts, employers and 
labor leaders. Following is a partial list of shops and con- 
cerns visited : 

I. Scientific Management Plants — (In Whole or in Part) 
Tabor Manufacturing Co., Philadelphia 
The Link Belt Co., Philadelphia 
The Standard Roller Bearing Co., Philadelphia 
Smith and Furbush Machine Co., Philadelphia 
Ferracute Machine Co., Bridgeton, New Jersey 
Brighton Mills, Passaic, New Jersey 
Acme Wire Co., New Haven, Connecticut 
Sayles Bleacheries, Saylesville, Rhode Island 
The Plimpton Press, Norwood, Massachusetts 
The New England Butt Co., Providence, Rhode Island 
The Watertown Arsenal, Watertown, Massachusetts 
The Remington Typewriter Co., Ilion, New York 
The H. H. Franklin Manufacturing Co., Syracuse, N. Y, 
The Diamond Chain and Manufacturing Co., Indianapolis, 

Ind. 
The Aluminum Castings Co., Detroit, Michigan 
Joseph and Feiss, Clothcraft Shops, Cleveland, Ohio 
The H. Black Co., Cleveland, Ohio 
The Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Co., East 

Pittsburgh, Pa. 
Jones and Laughlin Co., Pittsburgh, Pa. 
King Sewing Machine Co., Buffalo, New York 
The Republic Metalware Co., Buffalo, New York 



\ 



4 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

The Monarch Typewriter Co., Syracuse, New York 
The German-American Button Co., Rochester, New York 
The Northway Motor and Manufacturing Co., Detroit, 

Michigan 
Russell, Burdsall and Ward Bolt and Nut Co., Port Ches- 
ter, New York 

II. Other Plants 

Geo. Oldham and Sons Co., Philadelphia 
Newton Machine Co., Frankford, Philadelphia 
Filene's Specialty Store, Boston 
Jones and Lamson, Springfield, Vermont 
Ford Automobile Works, Detroit, Michigan 

III. Time Study and Systematizing Concerns 

Sanford E. Thompson, Time Study Expert, Newton High- 
j lands, Massachusetts 

Miner Chipman and Staff, Cambridge, Massachusetts 

In addition to visiting these shops and concerns, about 
one hundred and fifty scientific management leaders, sys- 
tematizers, employers, managers, time study men, labor 
leaders, and other authorities on the subject were con- 
sulted as individuals, including the following : Frederick W. 
Taylor, H. L. Gantt, Harrington Emerson, Carl G. Barth, 
Louis D. Brandeis, Samuel Gompers, Wm. B, Wilson, 
James Mapes Dodge, H. K. Hathaway, H. P. Kendall, A. 
E. Barter, James Hartness, Morris L. Cooke, Chas. Day, 
Fred J. Miller, E. M. Herr, J. E. Williams, Chas. Piez, 
Xjeq^ D. Babcock, F. A. Parkhurst, General Wm. Crozier, 
CorcTB. Whaler, R. A. Feiss, H. T. Noyes, F. A. Wal- 
dron, D. S. Kimball, F. G. Coburn, James Duncan and J. R. 
O'Leary. 

In pursuing this study, the investigator and the official 
experts were governed throughout by two standards of 
judgment. 

First, scientific management, in its relations to labor, must 
Ibe judged, not merely by the theories and claims, either of 
/its representatives or opponents, but mainly by what it 



GENESIS AND NATURE OF INVESTIGATION 5 

proves to be in its actual operation. Mr. Taylor, especially, 
has intimated that if any principle of scientific manage- 
ment which he has laid down is violated, scientific manage- 
ment ceases to exist. Evidently, the acceptance of this dic- 
tum would lead to endless quibbling, and would prevent 
the drawing of significant conclusions as to the actual 
character and tendencies of scientific management and its 
effects upon labor welfare. It would be as true to say 
that the church and the state rest upon certain fundamental 
principles, and that if any of these are violated in practice, 
church and state cease to exist. Scientific management, inl 
this respect, is like any other thing in the social or material 
world. It is what it is in fact, and not what the ideals orj 
theories of its advocates or opponents would have it to be. 
Labor and society at large are not interested especially inl 
the theory of scientific management as it exists in the mind 
of an individual, but in the way that it affects welfare in its 
application. Like all other things which affect human- 
ity, it must, therefore, be judged by actual results and ten- 
dencies. 

Secondly, it follows that the scope of scientific manage- 
ment — what features-a^e.JS-b^-"****'^^^^^ undeti it — is to bei 
determined, agam, not by the theories of its leaders, butf 
by what is found to exist and persist in the systematized 
portions of shops designated to represent it. If shops so 
designated by leaders of the movement generally lay em- 
phasis on so-called welfare work, or, in general, eliminate 
the spirit and the means for the expression of democracy, 
then welfare work must be considered a part of scientific 
management, and the absence of democracy a feature of it, 
though the former be excluded from the theoretical exposi- 
tions of its leaders, and democracy be declared by them to 
be the essence of scientific management. 

Throughout the study here presented, therefore, scien- 
tific man agemen t must be understoodtomean the_systems 
created and a pplied j jy Mr. TaylorTMr.Gantt, anoMn 
ESierson, and their adherents, as these systems actually 



6 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

work out in the shops designated by them, and to include 
whatever policies and methods investigation has proved to 
be characteristic of such shops, bearing in mind that the 
movement at present is not fixed and final, but is in its 
early stages of development. 

, In making this study, the effort has been to avoid per- 
..sonal bias, and to view all matters purely from the stand- 
point of fact and cause. The purpose of the investigation 
has been to lay foundations for the judgment of scientific 
management, not relative to an absolute ideal, but relative 
to the alternative which would exist without it. There is 
no desire to uphold or to condemn either party to the 
controversy, least of all to foment contest. The prime ob-l 
jects are to lay bare the facts of the actual situation and! 
to dispel misunderstandings, as a starting point and basis 
for reasonable control and constructive effort. Any critij 
cisms of scientific management which follow must be under- 
stood in this light. Nor should they be regarded as neces- 
sarily applicable to all scientific management shops. The 
writer has become acquainted with scientific managers for 
whom he has the highest respect and admiration — ^men 
who are capable of putting human above pecuniary consid- 
erations, who have the interest of their workmen truly at 
heart, so far as they see it, and who are glad to do all in 
their power to remedy evil effects that can be shown to 
exist. Unfortunately, these men do not represent the only 
type concerned with the installation and operation of the 
new systems, and in the interest of truth and justice, it 
has been necessary to weigh the evil with the good. 

Finally, the writer wishes to acknowledge the invaluable 
assistance of the official management and labor experts. 
Their presence and counsel have brought to light many 
significant facts that otherwise might have been overlooked, 
and their judgment has been of prime importance* in the 
weighing of the evidence secured. Without their hearty 
cooperation, the investigation would have proved relatively 
unprofitable, if not impossible. 



CLAIMS OF SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT 7 

2. The Claims of Scientific Management Relative 

TO Labor 

Scientific management in theory is not a single, con- 
sistent body of thought. While there is doubtless a funda- 
mental unity in the movement, various leaders and would- 
be leaders have arisen, each with his own peculiar doc- 
trines or his own particular emphasis upon special aspects 
of the system. Vital contradictions and important addi- 
tions and omissions have thus appeared which tend to sep- 
arate the scientific management group into schools, differing 
considerably in general viewpoint. The most important of I 
these so-called schools are those, respectively, of the late 
Mr. F. W. Taylor, Mr. H. L. Gantt, and Mr. Harrington 
Emerson.^ 

It is impossible to state the labor claims of the Taylor, 
Gantt and Emerson schools as one consistent whole, but 
it would be misleading to present them as three independent 
and equally important bodies of thought. Mr. Taylor is 
usually credited with being the founder of scientific man- 
agement and has been almost universally recognized as its 
leading exponent. His system is more complete, is worked* ■ 
out with greater consistency and concrete detail, and has^ 
been applied with greater fidelity than those of his rivals, j 
His adherents constitute also the strongest and most loyal 
body of scientific managers, and it is to the Taylor system 
that organized labor has most generally and most strenu- 
ously objected. In fact, the Taylor system has been and 
still is regarded in most quarters as scientific management 
par excellence and practically identified with the more in- 
clusive term. 

* These schools are not altogether distinct either in theory or 
practice. There is considerable overlapping of thought by the 
leaders and among the assumed followers; both within the schools 
and without, there is much diversity and departure from the model, 
due to a distinct element of charlatanism. 



8 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

Under these circumstances, the writer has felt justified 
in making Mr. Taylor's statements o£ the nature o£ scien- 
tific management and its relations to labor the standard 
claims of scientific management.^ In presenting the labor 
claims of scientific management, therefore, and in judging 
them with reference to the facts, the Taylor system has 
been taken as the positive basis of exposition and compari- 
son, the Gantt and Emerson claims being presented and 
dealt with only as they differ from or modify Mr. Taylor's 
statements. 

The labor claims of scientific management, according to 
Mr, Taylor, constitute a body of nearly forty leading points 
with many subordinate affirmations. Their general spirit 
and character may be indicated by the following much ab- 
breviated statements '? 

1. The General Definition of Scientific Management — 
Scientific management is a system devised by industrial 
engineers for the purpose of subserving the common inter- 
ests of employers, workmen, and society at large, through 
the elimination of avoidable wastes, the general improve- 
ment of the processes and methods of production, and the 
just and scientific distribution of the product. 

2, Fundamental Principles of ScientiHc Management. — 
■Scientific man|igement rests on the fundamental economic 
principles that harmony of interests exists between em- 
ployers and workers, and that high general wages and better 
general conditions of employment can be secured through 
low labor cost. 

J. The Relation of Scientific Management to Fact and 
Lazv. — Scientific management attempts to substitute in the 
relations between employers and workers the government 
of fact and law for the rule of force and opinion. It substi- 
tutes exact knowledge for guesswork and seeks to establish 

*The specific differences which, exist between the claims of Mr. 
Taylor, Mr. Gantt and Mr. Emerson are shown in Appendices III 
and IV. 

' For the full statement of the Taylor claims, see Appendix II. 



CLAIMS OF SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT 9 

a code of natural laws equally binding upon employers 
and workmen. 

4. The Scientific and Democratic Character of Scientific 
Management. — Scientific management is thus at once scien- 
tific and democratic. 

In time and motion study it has discovered and developed 
an accurate scientific method by which the great mass of 
laws governing the easiest and most productive movements 
of men are registered. These laws constitute a great code 
which, for the first time in industry, completely controls 
the acts of the management as well as those of the work- 
men. 

It pays men rather than positions and through its meth- 
ods of payment makes possible tlie— rewarding of each 
workman on the basis of his efficiency. It makes possible 
the scientific selection of workmen, i.e., the mutual adapta- 
tion of the task and the worker, and is a practical system 
of vocational guidance and training. 

It analyzes the operations of industry into their natural 
parts, makes careful studies of fatigue and sets the task 
on *the basis of a large number of performances by men 
of different capacities and with due and scientific allowance 
for the human factor and legitimate delays. 

It assigns to each workman a definite and by him ac- 
complishable task, institutes rational rest periods, and 
modes of 'recreation during the working hours, eliminates 
pace setters, standardizes performance, and guards the 
workers against over-speeding and exhaustion, nervously 
and physically. ' * 

It substitutes the rule of law for the arbitrary decisions 
of foremen, employers, and unions, and treats each worker 
as an independent personality. 

Scientific management thus democratizes industry. It 
gives a voice to both parties and substitutes joint obedience 
of employers and workers to fact and la^y for obedience to 
personal authority. No such democracy has ever existed 
in industry before. Every protest of every workman must 



10 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

be handled by those on the management side, and the 
right or wrong of the complaint must be settled not by the 
opinion, either of the management or the workman, but 
by the great code of laws which has been developed and 
which must satisfy both sides. It gives the worker in the 
end equal voice with the employer; both can refer only 
to the arbitrament of science and fact. 
/ 5. Scientific Management and Productive Efficiency. — 
Scientific management improves and standardizes the indus- 
trial organization and equipment, betters the training of the 
workmen and increases their skill and efficiency. 

It rationalizes the management, improves the methods 
of planning, routing and accounting, furnishes the best 
machinery, tools, and materials, eliminates avoidable wastes 
and standardizes the methods of work. 

It gathers up, systematizes and systematically transmits 
to the workers all the traditional craft knowledge and skill 
which is being lost and destroyed under current industrial 
methods. 

It employs in the shop a corps of competent specialists 
whose duty it is to instruct and train the workers, and to 
assist them whenever difficulties arise in connection with the 
work. 

It trains the men in the easiest and best methods of work, 
and brings the workmen into close and helpful touch with 
the management. 

It removes from each worker responsibility for the work 
of others, and prevents the more efficient from being held 
back and demoralized by the inefficient. 

It increases the productive output, and improves the 
quality of the product. 

6. Scientific Management and Labor Welfare. — Scien- 
tific management, through its accurate scientific methods, 
and the laws which it has discovered and established, its 
improvement of organization and equipment, and its demo- 
cratic spirit: 

Sets each workman to the highest task for which his 



CLAIMS OF SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT ii 

physical and intellectual capacity fits him, and tends to 
prevenf the degradation and displacement of skilled labor. 

It rewards the men for helpful suggestions and im- 
provements in the methods of work, and provides immedi- 
ate inspection and immediate rewards for increased or im- 
proved output. 

It requires the workers to perform, not one operation 
merely, but several operations or tasks. 

It trains the workmen mechanically as they were never 
trained before, opens the way for all workmen to become 
"first-class men," and opens up opportunities for the ad- 
vancement and promotion of the workers. 

It stimulates and energizes them intellectually, and pro- 
motes their self-reliance and individuality. 

It insures just treatment of individual workers, and pay 
to each in proportion to his efficiency. 

It guarantees the worker against the arbitrary alteration 
of the task, arbitrary rate cutting, and limitation of earn- 
ings. 
^ It raises wages and shortens the hours of labor. 

It increases the security and continuity of employment. 

It lessens the rigors of shop discipline. 

It promotes friendly feeling and relations between the 
management and the men, and among the workers of the 
shop or group. 

It renders collective bargaining and trad6 unionism un- 
necessary as means of protection to the workmen. 

It tends to prevent strikes and industrial warfare iand 
to remove the causes of social unrest. 



Mr. Gantt, in the past, has been closely associated with 
Mr. Taylor, and by many is still regarded as a member of 
the Taylor group. His chief claims to consideration as 
the founder and leader of a distinct school of efficiency 
rest upon the emphasis which he places in his writings on 
the labor or humanitarian aspects of scientific management, 



12 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

on the instruction of workmen, and on a task and bonus 
system of payment to take the place of Mr, Taylor's differ- 
ential piece-rate system.^ In most essentials, Mr. Gantt 
accepts the Taylor claims of scientific management, and 
with minor exceptions, subscribes to them in detail. He 
has not, however, gone so far as Mr, Taylor in emphasizing 
the democracy of scientific management, nor has he defi- 
nitely asserted that scientific management, especially through 
time study, has discovered and established a great code of 
laws which completely controls the actions of the manage- 
ment as well as those of the workmen. 

The labor claims of scientific management made by Mr. 
Emerson are, in general, much less comprehensive and 
specific than those put forward by Mr. Taylor. This, no 
doubt, is due in part to the fact that Mr. Emerson does 
not subscribe to any definite and .detailed system, but as- 
serts that he is engaged merely in the application of funda- 
mental principles to the industrial process.^ On his own 
testimony, he has not worked out a complete set of in- 
variable methods and devices to which he is wedded and 
which he is bound to defend. "We have no system," he 
states. "What we attempt to do is to apply certain princi- 
ples. We are willing to adopt any methods, any device, 
if it is advantageous." ^ While, therefore, Mr. Emerson 
says much of principles, when he leaves the discussion 
and comes down to the actual practice of scientific 
management, his claims are much less detailed and rigid 
than those of Mr, Taylor, He takes it for granted that 
"the ideal is never attained." * In fact, he deprecates the 

*It may be noted that the members of the Taylor group have 
generally adopted these modifications, at least, in theory. 

^ It should not be inferred from this statement that Mr. Emerson 
bases his work more on fundamental principles than Mr. Taylor, nor 
that Mr. Taylor would insist on any invariable set of forms, blanks, 
etc. 

* United' States Commission on Industrial Relations Hearings, p. 
1432. 

* Interview with the writer, Nov. 18, 1914. 



OBJECTIONS TO SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT 13 

idea that "shops can be found which will exactly represent 
the different systems." He admits that he has never been 
able to install more than a small fraction of what he should 
call "Emerson Company methods," and in his belief there 
is not more than one existing plant "which represents the 
ideas of any scientific manager unless it be some shop where 
the system was put in by the manager himself and, there- 
fore, represents his ideas." ^ 

It has been found impossible, therefore, to secure from 
Mr. Emerson personally or through what he has written 
any concrete systematic statement of his own labor claims 
or any definite and positive comment upon all the points 
covered by the labor claims of scientific management as au- 
thenticated by Mr. Taylor. He is probably in substantial 
accord with Mr. Taylor in many of his detailed claims, as 
evidenced by his failure to make positive objections to 
them when they were presented for his criticism. With 
respect to more fundamental matters, Mr. Emerson ex- 
presses a qualified belief in industrial democracy, in the 
possibility of exact scientific knowledge, and in the potency 
of natural law in industrial afifairs. Doubtless, however, he 
would not subscribe without "reserve to Mr. Taylor's positive 
claims for scientific management covering these matters, nor 
would he hold that scientific management always and of 
necessity deals out exact justice to the worker. 

3. The Trade Union Objections to Scientific 

Management 

It would be a grievous mistake to assume that organized 
labor, as a whole, is more consistent in positive theory and 
in viewpoint than scientific management. Trade unions are 
essentially opportunistic, they present vitally different types, 
their most general organization is little more than a loose 
affiliation of sovereign bodies, there is no individual or 
group which has unchallenged authority or right to speak 

^ Interview with the writer, Nov. 18, 1914. 



14 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

for the organic unit or the individual, and none which can 
be held responsible for the pronouncements of all those 
who as union men have raised their voices in protest against 
scientific management. No_.consistent or strictly authorita- 
tive statement of the trade union position relative to scien- 
tific management can, therefore, be made. 

There is one body, however, which far more than any 
other, can claim the right to voice the prevailing sentiment 
of organized labor in America. This body is the Executive 
i/Council of the American Federation of Labor. Its merh- 
bers are the elected representatives of nearly two and one- 
half millions of workers, and its president, Mr. Samuel 
Gompers, has for many years been recognized as the lead- 
ing exponent of labor thought and a most vital force in 
the molding of labor opinion. This Council has itself put 
forth no systematic statement of organized labor's objec- 
tions to scientific management, but the writer was able to 
secure through a committee of its appointing and through 
its officers, a careful revision of his own systematized com- 
pilation of those objections, drawn from all available 
sources. This statement he feels justified, therefore, in 
regarding as the nearest possible approach at present to 
an authoritative presentation of the trade union objections 
to scientific management. While it contains some charges 
authenticated merely as the expression of individual opinion 
to which the Council itself does not subscribe, in the main, 
the statement may be taken as representing the definite at- 
titude of the best informed and most influential group 
in organized labor toward scientific management and its 
methods. 

Like the labor claims of scientific management, the trade 
union objections to scientific management cover too large 
a number of general and specific points to warrant presen- 
tation in detail. On the other hand, their character and 
range are such as to preclude the possibility of condensa- 
-tion in a way to bring out fully and forcibly labor's multi- 
farious grounds of opposition. The following brief state- 



OBJECTIONS TO SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT 15 

ment, however, may serve as an indication of its general 
attitude and charges.^ 

1. The General Definition of Scientific Management. — 
Organized labor understands by the term, "scientific man- 
agement," certain well-defined "efficiency systems" which 
have been recently devised by individuals and small groups 
under the leadership and in imitation of men like Frederick 
W. Taylor, H. L. Gantt and Harrington Emerson, by whom 
this term has been preempted. Organized labor makes a 
clear distinction between "scientific management" thus de- 
fined and "science in management." It does not oppose sav- 
ings of waste and increase of output resulting from im- 
proved machinery and truly efficient management. It 
stands, therefore, definitely committed to "science in man- 
agement," and its objections are directed solely against sys- 
tems devised by the so-called "scientific management" cult. 

2. Scientific Management in Its Relation to Labor Wel- 
fare. — "Scientific management" thus defined is a device 
employed for the purpose of increasing production and 
profits; and tends to eliminate consideration for the char- 
acter, rights and welfare of the employees. 

It looks upon the worker as a mere instrument of pro- 
duction and reduces him to a semi-automatic attachment 
to the machine or tool. 

In spirit and essence, it is a cunningly devised speeding- 
up and sweating system, which puts a premium upon mus- 
cle and speed rather than brains, forces individuals to be- 
come "rushers" and "speeders"; stimulates and drives the 
workers up to the limit of nervous and physical exhaustion 
and over-speeds and over-strains them ; shows a constant 
tendency to increase the intensity and extent of the task; 
tends to displace all but the fastest workers; indicates a 
purpose to extract the last ounce of energy from the work- 
ers; and holds that if the task can be performed it is not 
too great. 

* The full statement of the trade union objections to scientific 
management will be found in Appendix V. 



i6 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

It intensifies the modern tendency toward specialization 
of the work and the task ; is destructive of mechanical edu- 
cation and skill; splits up the work into a series of minute 
tasks tending to confine the workers to the continuous per- 
formance of one of these tasks ; tends to eliminate skilled 
crafts ; deprives the worker of the opportunity of learning a 
trade; degrades the skilled wnrkfr^> to th-^ condition of the 
less skilled; displaces skilled workers and forces them into 
competition with the less skilled, and narrows the compet- 
itive field and weakens the bargaining strength of the work- 
ers through specialization of the task and the destruction of 
craft skill. 

It displaces day work and day wage by task work 
and the piece-rate, premium and bonus systems of pay- 
ment. 

It tends to set the task on the basis of "stunt" records 
of the strongest and swiftest workers without due allow- 
ance for the human element or legitimate delays, so that 
only a few of the strongest and most active workers are 
capable of accomplishing it, and has devised and established 
modes of payment, usually arranged so that it is greatly 
to the advantage of the employer to prevent the workers 
from equaling or exceeding the task, and which usually 
result in giving the worker less than the regular rate of 
pay for his extra exertion, and only a portion and usually 
the smaller portion of the product which his extra exertion 
has created. 

It establishes a rigid standard of wages regardless of the 
progressive increase in the cost of living, and tends to make 
it permanent at its present low level ; puts a limit upon the 
amount of wages which any man can earn ; offers no guar- 
anteee against rate cutting; is itself a systematic rate-cut- 
ting device ; tends to lower the wages of many immediately 
and permanently, and means in the long run more work 
for the same or less pay. 

It tends to lengthen the hours of labor; shortens the 
tenure of service; lessens the certainty and continuity of 



OBJECTIONS TO SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT 17 

employment; and leads to over-production and the increase 
of unemployment. 

It condemns the worker to a monotonous routine; tends 
to deprive him of thought, initiative, sense of achievement 
and joy in his work; dwarfs and represses him intellectu- 
ally ; tends to destroy his individuality and inventive genius ; 
increases the danger of industrial accidents ; tends to under- 
mine the worker's health, shortens his period of industrial 
activity and earning power, and brings on premature old 
age. 

It puts into the hands of employers at large an immense 
mass of information and methods which may be used un- 
scrupulously to the detriment of the workers, creates the 
possibility of systematic blacklisting, and offers no guaran- 
tee against the abuse of its professed principles and prac- 
tices. 

J. Scientific Management in Its Relation to Industrial 
Democracy. — ^"Scientific management" is undemocratic; 
it is a reversion to industrial autocracy which forces the 
workers to depend upon the employers' conception of 
fairness and limits the democratic safeguards of the 
workers. 

It tends to gather up and transfer to the management all 
the traditional knowledge, the judgment and the skill of 
the workers and monopolizes the initiative and skill of the 
workers in connection with the work. 

It allows the workman ordinarily no voice in hiring or 
discharge, the setting of the task, the determination of the 
wage rate or the general conditions of employment. 

It greatly intensifies unnecessary managerial dictation and 
discipline; tends to prevent the presentation and denies 
the consideration of grievances ; and tends to increase the 
number of shop offenses and the amount of docking and 
fining. 

It introduces the spirit of mutual suspicion and contest 
among the men, and thus destroys the solidarity and co- 
operative spirit of the group. 



i8 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

It has refused to deal with the workers except as indi- 
viduals. 

It is incompatible with and destructive of unionism; 
destroys all the protective rules established by unions and 
discriminates against union men. 

It is incompatible with and destructive of collective bar- 
gaining. 

4. The Unscientific Character of Scientific Manage- 
ment. — "Scientific management" in its relations to labor is 
unscientific. 

It does not take all the elements into consideration but 
deals with human beings as it does with inanimate ma- 
chines. 

It violates the fundamental principles of human nature 
by ignoring habits, temperament, and traditions of work and 
tends to minimize the acquired skill of the workers. 

It greatly increases the number of "unproductive work- 
ers," i.e., those engaged in clerical work, and often squeezes 
out of the workers vast overhead charges. 

It is unscientific and unfair in its determination of the 
task and furnishes no just or scientific basis for calculating 
the wage rate. 

It concerns itself almost wholly with the problem of pro- 
duction, disregarding in general the vital problem of dis- 
tribution, and violates and indefinitely postpones the appli- 
cation of the fundamental principle of justice to distribu- 
tion. 

It is based on the principle of the survival of the fittest 
and tends to disregard the physical welfare of the workers. 

5. The Inefficiency of Scientific Management. — "Scien- 
tific management" is fundamentally inefficient. 

It does not tend to develop general and long-time eco- 
nomic efficiency. 

It tends to emphasize quantity of product at the expense 
of quality, and to reduce the quality of the work and out- 
put. 

It is incapable of extensive application. 



OBJECTIONS TO SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT 19 

It is a theoretical conception already proven a failure in 
practice. 

6. Scientific Management and Industrial Unrest. — 
"Scientific management" intensifies the conditions of indus- 
trial unrest. 

It libels the character of the workmen, and its methods 
are evidence of suspicion and direct question of the hon- 
esty and fairness of the workers. 

It fails to satisfy the workers under it, but, on the con- 
trary, is regarded by them with extreme distaste. 

It pits workman against workman; displaces harmony 
and cooperation among the working group by mutual sus- 
picion and controversy, and increases the antagonism be- 
tween the workers and their employers. 

It increases the points of friction and offers no guaran- 
tee against industrial warfare and is conducive to strikes. 



PART II 

CRITICAL EXAMINATION OF SCIENTIFIC MAN- 
AGEMENT IN ITS RELATIONS TO LABOR 

A. Possible Benefits of Scientific Management to 
Labor and to Society 

Experience and reason leave no doubt that a close causal 
relation exists between productive efficiency and possible 
wages. No one can deny, therefore, that greater produc- 
tive efficiency and output make possible higher wages, in 
general, and better conditions of employment and labor. 
While in particular instances and trades, wage advances, 
improved conditions of work and better standards of living 
can be secured and maintained solely through increased 
bargaining power of the labor group, the community as a 
whole, including all classes of labor, can consume more 
and live better only through an increase in the goods pro- 
duced. But increase of output is dependent on lower cost 
of production. Mr. Taylor was right, therefore, when he 
set up as a goal of achievement and principle of scientific 
management, ''Higher wages with lower labor cost." Lower 
labor costs make higher wages possible, and, while lower 
capital costs are equally significant in this respect, without 
both, higher wages for all and in the long run are not likely 
to be realized to any considerable extent. 

In so far, then, as scientific management affords oppor- 
tunities for lower costs and increased production without 
adding to the burden of the workers in exhausting effort, 
long hours or inferior working conditions, it creates the pos- 

20 



BENEFITS OF SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT 21 

sibility of very real and substantial benefits to labor and to 
society. 

No one who has made a careful study of scientific man- 
agement can doubt that it does, at its best, afford such op- 
portunities to a very high degree. Fully and properly ap- 
plied, scientific management may include and may not be 
incompatible with, all that is covered in the phrase "Science 
in Management," and it has of itself developed many de- 
vices for the saving of waste and many policies and methods 
for the improvement of the productive processes, not ex- 
cluding ideas and methods which promise well for the bet- 
terment of labor conditions and the protection of labor 
interests. 

At its best, as set forth by Mr. Taylor, and as realized in 
practice, scientific management means a thoroughgoing im- 
provement and standardization of the material equipment 
and productive organization of the plant before an attempt 
is made to apply its peculiar methods and devices to the 
determination of standards of labor efficiency and wage 
payments. It means, thus, the installation of the best avail- 
able machinery and tools so far as compatible with economy, 
or, at least, the overhauling and improvement of the exist- 
ing equipment; the careful study of the materials of pro- 
duction and the determination of the speed and feed of the 
machines calculated under the circumstances to be most 
effective; the rearrangement of the material equipment so 
as to avoid the delays and expense of unnecessary carriage 
of materials and partly finished product, and to secure so 
far as possible continuous straight-line production; the in- 
troduction of known and new devices for economical and 
expeditious handling of materials and product; the careful 
study and analysis of the detailed processes and methods of 
production looking to-the elimination of waste motions ; the 
improvement of accessories ; and the most effective applica- 
tion of force and coordination of effort; the reorganization 
of the managerial staff with a view to avoiding so far as 
possible multiplicity of duties and to securing definiteness 



22 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

of function and responsibility, and, therefore, managerial 
efficiency in every detail; the improvement of the methods 
of record keeping and accounting so that exact knowledge 
may be had at all times of available equipment arid ma- 
terials on hand, their disposition, actual and prospective, 
that the productive needs of the concern may be met with- 
out friction or delay; reorganization of the sales^and pur- 
chasing departments with a view to broadening and stabiliz- 
ing the market for the product, and purchase by specifica- 
tion, at the most economical rates, and in accordance with 
needs ; improvements in the methods of stores-keeping 
which insure sufficiency of stock on hand, quick delivery 
and avoidance of interest and loss on superfluous and un- 
usable stock; better methods of tool storage, care and de- 
livery ; and many other material and organic improvements, 
all possible, theoretically precedent to and quite apart from 
the setting of new tasks; the introduction of new modes 
of payment or the alteration in general of labor conditions 
and relationships. Great progress, even, can be made with- 
out resort to any devices directly affecting the status of 
labor toward the careful planning of the productive proc- 
ess and toward the exact routing of stock and special or- 
ders so that all the separate parts shall pass through the 
shop by the shortest available routes on schedule time at 
rates that will insure the meeting at every point of the 
proper materials, tools, machinery and workmen, and final 
prompt assemblage, so that workmen may be constantly 
assigned to definite tasks without friction or delay. All this 
is part and parcel of scientific management, when fully and 
properly applied, and, standing by itself, means saving of 
waste, lower costs and increased output of production and 
consumption goods without any necessary addition to the 
burden of the workers in exhausting effort, long hours or 
inferior conditions of employment. 

Scientific management not only holds out, therefore, pos- 
sibilities of substantial benefits to labor, but it points the 
way and the only way toward raising the standard of living 



BENEFITS OF SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT 23 

for all classes of labor and for society at large. It is in the 
line of truly "efficient management" to which organized 
labor itself stands committed. Nor will it avail for labor 
to evade this issue by declaring that these features belong 
not to scientific management, but to science in management, 
for, on the principle that a thing must be defined in terms 
of what it actually is despite all efforts of friend or foe to 
fit it to their arbitrary conceptions, scientific management, 
at its best, is not only a systematic search for scientific pro- 
ductive methods, but is broad enough to include all that 
science in management demonstrates to be productively most 
efficient. That it is more than this and that its peculiar/ 
methods of dealing with labor may offset much or all of the ^ 
benefits thus made possible pertains to another aspect of j 
the problem and does not negative the conclusions stated 1 
above. 

But, it must not be assumed that scientific management 
in its direct relations to labor is devoid of possible beneficial 
aspects and results. Scientific management is to a large ex- 
tent an attempt at immediate standardization of labor con- 
ditions and relations. Through its analysis of jobs, it at- 
tempts to fix standard methods of labor and production in 
detail. It tries to set a standard task for each operation 
and advocates strict adherence to it. It attempts to establish 
standard rates of pay and through its vigorous claims that 
rates so set need not be and are not altered, coupled with 
the stress which it has laid upon the possibility of great 
savings and increased efficiency through the material and 
organic improvements of the productive process, it has 
forcibly called the attention of the struggling employer to 
the fact that there are other and more effective ways to 
meet severe competition than by taking it out of labor 
through the increase of the task and the cutting of wage 
rates.v In fact, it has incessantly proclaimed the doctrine 
that only through the strict maintenance of rates and ! 
standardized conditions of employment, and through fair i 
and liberal dealing with labor, can employers hope to escape | 



24 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

from the slough of inefficiency and the evils of cut-throat 
competition. The mere recognition of labor standards is 
always protective, and when such recognition is accom- 
panied not only by assurances of disaster to follow their 
violation, but by the demonstration that their maintenance 
is an essential factor in the general scheme of efficiency, the 
labor concerned stands to gain, in the long run, even though 
the advocates of standardization are not always themselves 
able to attain the ideal of standardization or are not guiltless 
of its violation. 

It is true that scientific management and organized labor 
are not altogether in harmony in their attitude toward stand- 
ardization of labor conditions and relations. While both 
seek to have the conditions of work and pay clearly de- 
fined and definitely maintained at any given moment, they 
differ fundamentally as to the circumstances which may 
justly cause the substitution of new standards for old ones. 
Trade unionism tends to hold to the idea that standards 
must not be changed in any way to the detriment of the 
workers. Scientific management, on the other hand, tends 
to regard changes as justified if they result in increase 
of efficiency. As we shall see later, time study, perhaps 
the most characteristic single feature of scientific manage- 
ment, constantly suggests and demonstrates new and more 
efficient means and methods for doing work. While, there- 
fore, trade unionism and scientific management both seek 
standardization in the sense of definite conditions of work 
and pay, for all those engaged in a particular operation 
at any given moment, trade unionism stands for a mainte- 
nance of these conditions over a long period of time, while 
scientific management tends to result in their progressive 
alteration. Nevertheless, the adherence of scientific man- 
agement to the ideal of the strict maintenance of standard 
conditions of work and pay as long as the efficiency con- 
ditions are not altered, marks a distinct advance in the 
interests of labor over the ideals which have been apt to 
govern the relations of employers to unorganized labor. 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 25 

The same may be said of many other major claims of 
scientific management. Quite apart from the question of 
whether the ideals advocated are attained or at present 
attainable, and whether scientific managers are to be found 
who purposely violate them, scientific management has in 
these claims and in the methods upon which they are based, 
shown the way along which we may proceed to more ad- 
vantageous economic results for labor and for society. It 
may not have succeeded in establishing a practical system 
of vocational selection and adaptation, but it has emphasized 
the desirability of it; it may not set the task with due and 
scientific allowance for fatigue so that the worker is guarded 
against over-speeding and over-exertion, but it has un- 
doubtedly developed methods which make it possible to 
better prevailing conditions in this respect; it has called 
attention most forcibly to the evils of the favoritism, and 
the rough and arbitrary decisions of foremen and others in 
authority. If scientific management be shown to have posi- 
tive objectionable features, both from the standpoint of 
labor and the welfare of society, this constitutes no denial 
of these beneficial features, but calls rather for intelligent 
social action to eliminate that which is detrimental and to 
supplement and control that which is beneficial to all. For- 
tunately, scientific management, in spite of dogmatic state- 
ments of certain leaders, is not one rigid and indivisible 
whole which must be accepted or rejected as it is, but is 
rather an experimental and developing entity, which can 
be modified and molded if its character and implications are 
thoroughly understood. 

B. Scientific Management in Practice 

I. Introduction 

It is a common assumption that scientific management 
shops, in organization and methods, conform closely to the 
ideal and models presented by the leaders. This assumption 



26 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

is completely shattered by first-hand study of the facts. 
Comparative research demonstrates beyond any reasonable 
doubt that scientific management in practice is characterized 
by manifold diversity and by striking incompleteness, as 
compared with its theoretical counterpart. 

In the course of the present investigation, no single shop 
was found which could be said to represent fully and 
. faithfully the Taylor system as presented in the treatise on 
"Shop Management" ; no representative of the Gantt system 
was encountered, complete and unmixed with alien ele- 
ments ; no shop was discovered wherein the Emerson ideals 
were completely demonstrated and held full sway, and no 
two shops were found in which identically or even approxi- 
,mately the same policies and methods were established and 
adhered to throughout. 

If all this be true of the shops specially listed as repre- 
sentative by the three recognized leaders of scientific man- 
agement, the variation that exists over the whole field of 
its 'activity, due to the operation of "independent experts" 
and the unsupervised efforts of managers, may well be im- 
agined. It would appear in fact that scientific manage- 
ment in practice is never fully installed, the system never 
wholly conformable with the ideals and principles laid down 
by the leaders, and that each management has to some 
I extent at least its own peculiar viewpoint and its own pecu- 
I liar policies and methods which prevail in the installation 
I and operation of the system. 

This incompleteness and diversity in practice apply not 
merely to unimportant matters of detail but cover many of 
the most essential features of scientific management even 
among those shops designated by Taylor, Gantt and Emer- 
son as representative of their work and influence. While 
in certain particular respects the ideals of the leaders are 
fairly carried out and consistency prevails, it is no exaggera- 
tion to say that incompleteness and diversity begin with 
the initial act of installation and end only with the latest 
specific features touching the operations of the shop and 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 2.y 

the relations existing between the workers and the manage- 
ment. 

A stout volume would be required to set forth these di- 
versities and to show the possible and actual bearing which 
they have upon the claims of scientific management and the 
welfare of the labor employed under it. It will be possible 
here merely to touch briefly upon a few of 'the most im- 
portant aspects' of this prevailing characteristic of scientific 
management in practice, 

2. The General Order and Completeness of Installation 

The best ideals of scientific management as expressed by 
Mr. Taylor and some of his most intimate associates ^ re- 
quire that the installation of the system shall begin with a 
thoroughgoing study, improvement where possible, and 
standardization of the material equipment, managerial or- 
ganization and productive processes of the shop. This 
preliminary work involves most of the details mentioned 
in the section on "Possible Benefits of Scientific Manage- 
ment." ^ Not until this material and organic improvement 

* On page 8 it was stated that in examining the practice of sci- 
entific management as compared with the claims, the Taylor claims 
"are taken as the general basis of comparison. When, therefore, in 
what follows, it is pointed out that these claims are not always 
realized in scientific management shops generally, including Gantt 
and Emerson establishments, this must not be taken as necessarily 
condemnatoryr 

' * The installation of the best available machinery and tools so far 
as compatible with economy, or at least the overhauling and im- 
provement of the existing equipment; the careful study of the 
materials of production and the determination of the speed and 
feed of the machines calculated under the circumstances to be most 
effective; the rearrangement of the material equipment so as to 
avoid the delays and expense of unnecessary carriage of materials 
and partly finished product, and to secure, as far as possible, con- 
tinuous, straight-line production; the introduction of new and 
known devices for convenience and expedition in the handling of 
materials and product; the careful study and analysis of detailed 



28 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

and standardization have been far advanced can definite 
tasks and efficiency ratings be fixed and rates of wage pay- 
ment based on accomplishment be estabHshed, without- the 
possibility and probability of grave injustice to workers, and, 
if the tasks are set closely, without the danger of over- 
speeding and exhausting at least some of them. For, with- 
out a high degree of material and organic efficiency and 
thorough standardization of equipment and processes, the 
conditions essential to high labor efficiency cannot be at- 
tained and uniformly maintained within a group, nor can 
individual workers be guaranteed against hampering cir- 
cumstances over which they have no control. 

Notwithstanding, however, the position taken by the au- 
thorities in this matter and the clearest demonstration of 
the facts as stated, in practice there is no general adherence 

processes and methods of production looking to the elimination of 
waste motions, the improvement of accessories and the most ef- 
fective application of force and coordination of effort; the reorgan- 
ization of the managerial staff so as to avoid as far as possible in- 
dividual multiplicity of duties, and to secure definiteness of func- 
tion and responsibility, and, therefore, managerial efficiency in every 
detail; the improvement of the methods of record keeping and ac- 
counting so that exact knowledge may be had at all times of avail- 
able equipment and materials on hand, their disposition, actual and 
prospective, that the productive needs of the concern may be met 
without friction or delay; the reorganization of the sales and pur- 
chasing departments with a view to broadening and stabilizing the 
market for the product, and purchase by specification at the most 
economical rates, and in accordance with needs ; improvements in 
the method of stores-keeping which insure sufficiency of stock on 
hand, quick delivery, and avoidance of interest and loss on super- 
fluous and unusable stock; better methods of tool storage, care 
and delivery; so far as possible the careful planning of the pro- 
ductive process and the exact routing of stock and special orders, 
so that all the separate parts shall pass through the shop by the 
shortest available routes, on schedule time, at rates that will insure 
the meeting at every point of the proper materials, tools, machinery 
and workmen, and final prompt assemblage, and so that workmen 
may be constantly assigned to definite tasks without friction or 
delay. 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 29 

to the order of installation as laid down by Mr. Taylor, 
and, in many cases, there is a notable neglect of the process 
of organic and material improvement. The better class of 
experts do indeed insist on beginning the installation of 
scientific management with the study and standardization 
of the material and organic factors. But, generally speak- 
ing, they are not able to carry this work forward to a 
reasonable degree before being forced to enter upon definite 
task setting or efficiency rating based on time study and 
the introduction of so-called "efficiency systems" of pay- 
ment. The management usually wants to see quicker re- 
turns than can be secured by the slow process of systematic 
and thoroughgoing reorganization and the expert is usually 
forced to yield to the demand for immediate results that 
can be measured in cash terms. But it must not be sup- 
posed that all the experts even resist such demands. The 
better class in this respect are decidedly in the minority. 
It is safe to say that most of those who offer their services 
to employers have not themselves the ability or the willing- 
ness to install scientific management in accordance with the 
Taylor formula and ideals. They, too, are prevailingly 
after quick returns with small regard for the long-time 
outcome and Httle real knowledge or consideration for the 
real effects upon the workers so long as the latter can be 
kept reasonably contented and a good showing be 
made. 

The result is that among the shops systematized there is 
no general uniformity in the process or completeness of 
installation. Thoroughgoing material and organic improve- 
ment and standardization are very often delayed and very 
often neglected. Some particular aspect or feature of the 
system is not infrequently stressed out of all proportion and 
this is very apt to be task setting or some particular system 
of payment. Sometimes, even, these labor features are the 
only ones seriously dealt with, and there are cases where 
they are the only important results of the work of the ex- 
perts and where they become in the minds of both expert 



30 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

and management the essence and almost the only corporeal 
reality of scientific management. ' , 

In short, in this most general and important aspect of the 
order and thoroughness of installation, scientific, manage- 
ment may mean anything or almost nothing, viewed from 
the standpoint ^of the ideals and principles of the leaders. 
In character and operation, the systematized shops range 
from a few which fairly closely approach the elaborate 
scheme advocated by Mr. Taylor through all possible varia- 
tions down to that in which some single feature of his sys- 
tem is applied unaccompanied brother methods and policies 
neeessary to make it a reasonable and effective agency of 
efficiency. Between these extremes, the forms of the Tay- 
lor system are often installed with more or less complete- 
ness at the same time that the spirit and principles are vio- 
lated and discarded. 

Among the specific aspects of the system exhibiting thus 
in practice great variation in character and results, often 
with serious violations or positive neglect of the Taylor 
claims and principles, are these : f unction'al f oremanship ; the 
methods employed in the selection and hiring of workmen ; ■ 
the character, extent and results of attempts at adaptation, 
instrugtion and training of the workers ; the purposes, meth- 
ods and results of time study and task setting; the methods^ 
of rate making and the modes of payment employed, with 
their effects, especially on the maintaining of rates; the 
means used for protecting the workers from over-exertion 
and exhaustion; the opportunities offered for advancement 
and promotion ; the modes of discipline ; the methods of 
discharge and the length of service ; and, finally, the general 
spirit and attitude adopted and maintained in dealing with 
the workers — the extent to which they are allowed a voice 
in the making of vital decisions; the means provided for 
the receiving of complaints ; the consideration given to 
grievances and the- nature of the final authority exercised. 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 31 

5. Functional Foremanship 

Relatively few of the scientific management shops employ 
the full systeih of functional foremanship, as outlined by 
Mr. Taylor. Some have never seriously attempted its in- 
stallation. Others have installed it and later returned in 
full or in part to the old military order. In probably a ma- 
jority of the shops, the old line" foreman has not been en- 
tirely dethroned but sorfie of his duties have usually been 
lopped off and assigned to other functionaries. The extent 
of this redistribution of duties and the amount of authority 
thus taken from the department foreman vary greatly. ' 
Often the new officials perform merely or mainly delegated 
duties, the old time foreman retaining practically all or a 
great part of his former directive and arbitrary authority. 
This seems to be the case particularly where labor isL di- 
rectly concerned. Other persons may be employed to deal 
with details of hiring, discipline^ and discharge, but the old 
line foreman, even so, not infrequently retains and exercises ■ 
much of his formef power in connection with these matters. 
The logical distribution of duties according to the Taylor 
scheme seems more capable of practical fulfillment than the 
distribution of authority. But in neither respect does, scien- 
tific management in practice generally attain or approach 
with any degree of uniformity to the Taylor ideal. The re- 
sults are such as to weaken materially the claims that scien- 
tific management treats each workman as an independent 
personality and that it substitutes joint obedience to fact and 
law for obedience to personal authority. 

4. The Methods Employed in the Selection and Hiring of 

Workmen 

Little uniformity prevails among the scientific manage- 
ment shops in the methods of selection and hiring, and no 
reasonable justifi<!ation has been found for the claims that 
scientific management makes possible the scientific selection 



32 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

of the workers. Prevailingly, workers are selected and hired 
by the ordinary methods used in outside shops with all the 
variation which this statement implies. At the best, a sep- 
arate labor department is established, charged with the duty 
of selecting workers, but rarely with final authority in the 
matter of hiring. The applicants are interviewed and ob- 
served in an attempt to discover their general capacity and 
aptitudes, mental and physical; their training, experience, 
industrial record, home surroundings, mode of life and 
habits are looked into and recorded, and often their state 
of health and strength are determined by physical examina- 
tion. On the basis of this information, the best chances 
are selected and assigned to what appears to be appropriate 
work. The results thus attained depend, of course, on the 
intelligence and training of the labor head and the extent to 
which he is unhampered by less intelligent foremen and 
superintendents. In these respects much was found to be 
lacking. Some of the labor heads are men and women of 
long experience and keen intelligence. A greater number 
are young and of doubtful experience and capacity. Scarcely 
any who were interviewed seemed well acquainted with the 
best thought and experimental efforts and results in this 
connection. The more intelligent confessed to ignorance 
and to dissatisfaction with the methods used. Some hopeful 
results were found but the best were discovered outside 
scientific management shops. Generally, the work of the 
labor heads was hampered by other shop authorities. Ex- 
cept in a few of the most completely systematized establish- 
ments where the system has been relatively long in opera- 
tion, some foremen or superintendents are apt to be found 
who cling tenaciously to their prerogatives, and openly or 
secretly attempt to nullify the new methods. But, on the 
whole, the work and results of the better class of scientific 
management shops, in the matter of selection and hiring, 
compared very favorably with the most advanced outside 
establishments. 

At the worst, the methods of selection and hiring em- 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 33 

ployed by scientific management shops were found to differ 
in no essential respect from those which are characteristic 
of the ordinary run of industrial establishments. Appli- 
cants are secured by the ordinary methods of notice posting, 
passing the word among employees to bring in friends and 
acquaintances, or newspaper advertising. Workmen are 
hired by foremen and superintendents and assigned to duties 
as openings happen to appear without any special investiga- 
tion or any special attempt to determine individual charac- 
teristics and aptitudes. 

Between the best and the worst, as thus described, all 
the usual degrees of variation exist. On the whole, there 
is practically nothing in connection with the methods of 
selection and hiring to distinguish the special group of scien- 
tific management shops from the outside situation with its 
good, bad and indifferent establishments, unless it be a cer- 
tain tendency on the part of some to give trial to certain 
pseudo-scientific methods and systems. 

Nevertheless, it must be conceded that, generally speaking, 
the workers in scientific management shops seem to be a 
select class when compared with the same classes of workers 
outside, but this result appears to be due not so much to the 
methods of initial selection employed as to subsequent events 
which tend to weed out the less satisfactory material. It cer- 
tainly is not the outcome of any unique or scientific discov- 
eries and achievements ' in connection with the process of 
hiring. But while all this constitutes a positive negation of 
scientific management claims in this connection, it should 
not be regarded as any attempt at condemnation of the sys- 
tem itself. The claims cannot be sustained merely because 
those who resort to scientific management are ordinary hu- 
man beings, ordinarily circumstanced, and a scientific system 
of selection and hiring is still to be discovered. 



34 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

5. The Character, Extent and Results of Attempts at Adap- 
tation, Instruction and Training of the Workers 

Once within the shop, scientific management, according to 
the claims made by Mr. Taylor, solves completely the vex- 
ing problem of the adaptation and adequate training of the 
workers. It sets "each man to the highest task for which 
his physical and intellectual capacity fits him," "employs in 
the shop a corps of competent specialists whose duty it is to 
instruct and train the workers and to assist them whenever 
difficulties arise in connection with the work," "systemati- 
cally transmits" to them "all the traditional craft knowl- 
edge and skill which is being lost and destroyed under cur- 
rent industrial methods," "requires workmen to learn and 
to perform not one merely but several operations or tasks," 
and "educates and trains them mechanically as they were 
never trained before." In short, it constitutes a "practical 
system of vocational guidance and training," making possi- 
ble the "mutual adaptation of the task and the worker," 
and opening the way "for all workmen to become 'first-class 
men.' " 

It is evident that here we are in touch with the most 
vital problems of industry, viewed from the standpoint of 
general social well-being. . It is the narrowing and destruc- 
tion of skill and the mal-adaptation of workmen which have 
accompanied the development of modern industry that con- 
stitute one of the causes of discontent, degeneracy, crime, 
inefficiency and poverty. If scientific management can show 
the way through practical vocational adaptation and the re- 
habilitation of craftsmanship to the elimination or allevia- 
tion of these evils, it deserves the support of all classes 
whatever be its limitations and shortcomings. 

But, unfortunately, investigation reveals little to sub- 
stantiate the sweeping claims of scientific managers made 
in this connection, and much to show that in these matters 
also scientific management in practice varies with the special 
conditions found in different industries and with the special 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 35 

motives and exigencies which determine the policies of dif- 
ferent shops. 

Nowhere did the writer discover any scientific or ade- 
quate methods employed for adapting the worker' to the 
task, that is, for "setting each man to the highest task for 
which his physical and intellectual capacity fits him." Aside 
from the initial process of selection which at best, as we 
have seen, falls far short of anything scientific or com- 
pletely satisfactory in this respect, scientific management 
shops, in general, depend upon nothing in the way of general 
occupational adaptation of the workers except the ordinary 
trial and error method. The workman is set to the task 
for which he seems by general character and experience to 
be best fitted ; if he fails after repeated trials, he is tried out 
elsewhere or finally let out. If he succeeds, little further 
attention is ordinarily given to the matter unless he shows 
special proficiency, in which case he is in line for promo- 
tion. Experimental tests may have been made by scientific 
management experts, psychological and physiological, for 
determining special industrial qualifications and aptitudes 
of workers, but none of them was discovered in the shops. 
Indeed, the impression of the writer was very strong that 
the average manager in a scientific management shop is not 
only quite indifferent to, but profoundly ignorant of, the 
broader and deeper aspects of the problem of vocational 
selection and adaptation. The term adaptation means to 
him setting the worker to an accomplishable task, and his 
whole philosophy of adaptation, in fact, seems to be summed 
up in the idea that if the workman makes the task, the 
problem is solved; unless he shows special proficiency, he 
may then be assumed to be "set to the highest task for 
which his physical and intellectual' capacity fits him." This 
is not perhaps surprising, for the claims in this connection 
could only be the outcome of insufficient knowledge and 
understanding. It is generally recognized that the problem 
of vocational selection and adaptation is still far from 
solution. Psychologists have perhaps developed a technique 



36 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

to determine which of two men is better able at the time 
to perform a new task, but they have no technique, as yet, 
for determining which of these two men would finally be- 
come the better worker at the task, nor any for determining 
in which task any man would reach his greatest develop- 
ment. All this seems possible, but it is still a laboratory 
problem, and it is generally acknowledged that it will take 
years of study and experimentation by trained psychologists 
before the result is achieved. 

Whether scientific management in practice makes good 
the claim of adaptation in the narrower sense of the term, 
i.e., whether it succeeds in assigning each workman "to a 
definite and by him accomplishable task," will be consid- 
ered in a later connection. 

The attention given to the instruction and training of 
workmen in scientific management shops is, in general, 
greater than that which exists in similar modern establish- 
ments as a whole, and the methods thus employed are at 
their best greatly in advance of those which characterize the 
average outside establishment, where apprenticeship has 
been abandoned. In shops where instruction is really 
stressed and where attention is devoted to the improvement 
and standardization of the processes and methods of work, 
the new hand is not dependent on the haphazard and 
grudging assistance of fellow workers, but is put in charge 
of competent instructors and is trained in the easiest and 
best methods of performing the work to which he is as- 
signed, and both new and old workers receive the intelligent 
assistance of these instructors whenever difficulties arise in 
connection with the work. 

The general claims of scientific management, however, 
in this connection, are far from being justified by the facts, 
for not only is there here also great diversity in the char- 
acter and extent of the instruction actually offered, but the 
ideal of instruction in particular specialized tasks, to which 
scientific management stands committed, is ill-calculated to 
secure adequate results in this respect. 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 37 

/ 



7 



The employment of a special corps of instructors is by 
no means universal in scientific management shops. I 
some, no instructors were found, but new workmen were 
forced to depend entirely upon fellow workers and old line 
foremen for any assistance and training which they might 
receive. Where instructors were found, their duties were 
not always solely of an instructional character, but some- 
times combined the often incongruous function of seeing 
that no worker lagged or failed to do his utmost toward the 
attainment of the task or complement of work assigned to 
him for the day. Where special instruction was given, it 
ranged all the way from careful initial training and, there- 
after, friendly supervision, suggestion and assistance down 
to a few hours or moments of preliminary teaching and ob- 
servation, after which the worker was thrown upon his 
own resources. The technical aids to instruction also varied 
greatly from industry to industry, from shop to shop, and 
from task to task. This is especially true of standard 
written instruction cards, which are. generally supposed to 
be a universal characteristic of scientific management. In 
some cases, these cards, containing a most elaborate and 
minute analysis of the job with the time for each operation 
and drawings of the piece, are furnished each workman 
with each job, and absolute conformity thereto is demanded 
in the doing of the work; in other cases, such a card is 
posted for the section and the worker follows it or not as 
he prefers, the only demand being that the required results 
be attained. As the job becomes simpler and the work more 
repetitive, the written instruction card degenerates until 
it becomes a mere order to do so much work in so much 
time for so much pay, \yhile toward the other extreme where 
the work requires exceptional judgment, skill and discretion, 
it also loses its significance and utility, and tends altogether 
to disappear. 

This example perhaps fairly typifies the extremes of vari- 
ation that exist among the group of scientific management 
shops with respect to the whole matter of instruction and 



38 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

training. Yet there is in this connection one universal 
ideal of scientific management which tends to work out uni- 
formly in practice. Scientific management is essentially 
committed to division of function, which so far as the work- 
man is concerned, is another name for specialization, and 
it works out practically in a tendency to confine and narrow 
the training of the individual worker. Scientific manage- 
ment shops, in general, have eliminated the apprenticeship 
system except for the training of a few beginners destined 
for managerial positions. In some cases, remnants of ap- 
prenticeship exist, which, in the form of schools, furnish 
instruction to beginners, but it is instruction for a particular 
kind of work. Scientific managers, in general, without hesi- 
tation, declare a preference for the one-job or machine 
specialist over the all-round workman. In the shops there 
is little, if any, attempt to train the mass of the workers 
in "not one merely but several operations or tasks." The 
theoretically systematic transmission to the workers "of all 
the traditional craft knowledge which is being lost and de- 
stroyed under current industrial methods," amounts in prac- 
tice to the transmission to the individual of the knowledge 
required for his particular narrow job. Some few man- 
agers were found who did, indeed, favor the idea of a gen- 
eral shifting of all the workers through the section or de- 
partment, and one or two who regarded such shifting as 
not impossible, but the idea was generally discountenanced 
and the practice was never found. It is not intended, how- 
ever, to assert that all workers in scientific management 
shops are, as a matter of fact, narrow specialists, or that 
the design is to have them so. There is a practical limit 
to specialization decreed by the general exigencies of indus- 
try. Specialist workers are frequently absent and often 
their places must be filled immediately if the regular proc- 
ess of production is to proceed. Variation of orders and 
slack seasons also require that a certain portion of the 
workers be capable of shifting and of performing extra 
duties in the one case to meet special demands, and in the 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 39 

other to maintain an efficient organization. Scientific man- 
agers are not blind to these exigencies and, hke other em- 
ployers, attempt to provide for them. Sometimes this pro- 
vision is made in the process of hiring, sometimes by care- 
fully listing the capability of workers, and no doubt, at 
times, by the training of some of them in a plurality of op- 
erations. The fact remains, however, that, in general, the 
ideal which is upheld and striven for is specialized work- 
manship, and that instruction and training in scientific man- 
agement shops are generally adapted to this end. 

The writer does not wish to be held as attempting to con- 
demn scientific management on this score. It may be that 
breadth of training in the shop is of necessity under mod- 
ern conditions becoming progressively a thing of the past. 
If so, the stress which is laid by scientific management 
theory upon special instruction and training is in the highest 
degree commendable. Nor in spite of the variation whichi 
exists are the actual results to be lightly discounted. While 
the claims in this respect are not borne out — some of them 
being gross exaggerations, others positive negations of the 
facts — in the better scientific management shops, many 
workmen, no doubt, are receiving more careful instruction 
and a higher degree of training than is at present possible 
for them elsewhere. The most that can be said is that 
scientific management as such furthers a tendency to nar- 
row the scope of the workers' industrial activity, and that 
it falls far short of a compensatory equivalent in its ideals 
and actual methods of instruction and training. More care- 
ful consideration will be given to this matter, however, in 
a later section. 

6. Time Study and Task Setting: Their Purposes, Methods 
and Results 

To the uninitiated or to those who accept uncritically 
the scientific management claims, time study is time study, 
always with a definite purpose, an invariable method, and 



40 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

with results which are in the nature of exact and, there- 
fore, indisputable knowledge, "Time and motion study," 
says Mr. Taylor, "is the accurate scientific method by which 
the great mass of laws governing the best and easiest and 
most productive movements of men are investigated.'" 
"They substitute exact knowledge for prejudiced opinion 
and force in determining all the conditions of work and 
pay." The implication, borne out by other equally positive 
assertions, is that the task based on time study is set with 
scientific accuracy both with reference to the material con- 
ditions and the capacity of the workers employed, and the 
just demands which can be made upon them. Each work- 
man "is assigned to a definite and by him accomplishable 
task," and with "due and scientific allowance for the human 
factor and legitimate delays." The results of time study 
are, therefore, not a legitimate subject of bargaining since 
they partake of the nature of objective scientific fact in 
the determination of which the prejudices and opinions of 
men have had no part. "As reasonably," says Mr. Taylor, 
"might we insist on bargaining about the time and place of 
the rising and setting of the sun." ^ 

It is just in this connection, however, that the unbiased 
investigator receives perhaps his strongest impressions of 
the diversities of the so-called scientific management meth- 
1 ods. Far from being the invariable and purely objective 
I matters that they are pictured, the methods and results of 
time study and task setting are, in practice, the special sport 
'of individual judgment and opinion, subject to all the possi- 
bilities of diversity, inaccuracy and injustice that arise from 
human ignorance and prejudice. 

*The term bargaining, as used by the writer in this study, ap- 
plies to that condition existing where differences arise between 
workmen and employers, and these are jointly considered with the 
view of effecting an adjustment and mutual agreement upon the 
questions through an examination of the facts surrounding the 
point or points upon which differences of opinions had arisen. Mr. 
Taylor seems often to use the term in a way to imply that It 
dispenses with the consideration of facts. 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 41 

In making this statement, it is not intended to condemn 
time study and task setting, as such, or to deny that under 
certain special conditions, to be noted later, results approach- 
ing scientific accuracy are possible by these methods. Neither 
is it to be inferred that time study does not hold out the 
possibility of improvement over the current methods of 
task setting, nor that in some scientific management shops 
the methods used are not fair and the results attained are 
not beneficial to the workers. The statement merely char- 
acterizes the situation as it has been found actually to 
exist. 

This practical diversity and unscientific inaccuracy in con- 
nection with time study and task setting, resulting from the 
injection of the fallible human factor, begins, in practice, 
with the purposes for which time study is employed, and 
ends only with the final time which is set for the accom- 
plishment of the task or the final establishment of a scale of 
efficiency relative to the doing of a piece of work. 

Speaking broadly, there are two main purposes for which 
time study may be employed. It may be used primarily 
for the study, improvement, and standardization of the 
methods of doing the work under observation, altogether 
without reference to a standard time for its accomplish- 
ment, or it may have for its main or sole purpose the fixing 
of a definite task time or efficiency scale. In the first case, 
for example, a job may be studied with or without the stop 
watch to determine whether it is properly located as to se- 
quence in the industrial process, whether the conditions of 
safety and sanitation are up to the standard, whether the 
best available machinery is used for the purpose, with 
properly regulated speed and feed, whether the best tools 
and materials are well supplied and conveniently located, 
and the product handled to the best advantage ; whether 
the worker is employing efficient methods in the most effi- 
cient sequence and what improvements in the process may 
be made to advantage, etc., etc. In the second case, the 
conditions just named are all supposed to have been fixed. 



42 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

The stop watch is now used on selected workmen to de- 
termine what time is to be allowed the workers for the per- 
formance of the task or at a rating of lOO per cent, effi- 
ciency. 

Great possibilities of advantage both to the employer 
and the workmen exist in time study employed for the pur- 
pose first named. The writer has seen examples and re- 
sults of this work which commanded his unqualified ad- 
miration, and he has no hesitation in affirming that time 
study may thus be used to work revolutionary improvements 
in current industrial methods generally, without any neces- 
sary evils to workers individually or as a class. 

Unfortunately, scientific management employers, in gen- 
eral, do not live up to the highest ideals in this connection. 
Some, even, do not recognize this vital distinction between 
time study for standardization and time study for task 
setting or efficiency rating. The result is that in a large 
proportion of the shops time study for standardization is 
relatively neglected. Even where this distinction is under- 
stood and its importance recognized, it is frequently ignored 
in practice. This is especially true of shops which turn out 
a variety of products, and in which the models change fre- 
quently. Here where perhaps a thousand new tasks are 
sometimes set within a month, ignorance or indifference to 
the welfare of the workers, or considerations of time and 
immediate economy, frequently cause tasks to be set with- 
out the preliminary time study for standardization which is 
necessary to insure fair and uniform conditions and re- 
sults. 

In general, the greatest variation was found to exist in 
this connection. Shops were visited where no tasks based 
on immediate time study were set without months or per- 
haps years of preliminary preparation and hundreds of time 
studies made on each job solely for purposes of improve- 
ment and standardization. Others were examined where 
the first and only timing determined the task by which any 
worker on the job was rated. Between these extremes, the 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 43 

greatest variation was found to exist sometimes within the 
same shop. 

It is not, however, variation in the emphasis placed on 
the two distinct purposes of time study that chiefly im- 
presses the impartial investigator of scientific management, 
as practiced. More noticeable by far are the variations in 
the actual methods employed in determining the time al- 
lowed for the accomplishment of tasks or for the rating of 
efficiency, and especially the part which fallible human judg- 
ment and individual prejudice may and do play in arriving 
thus at what are assumed to be objective scientific results. 

In order that this matter, which is one of the vital points 
of controversy between scientific management and organized 
labor, may be cleared up, it will be necessary to describe 
the general process of time study somewhat in detail. The 
normal method of making time studies for task setting or 
efficiency rating — if a normal method may be said to exist 
where there is so much diversity — may be described thus : 
After the job or task in question has been standardized, 
it is analyzed by the time study man into its elementary 1 
parts or motions. These are set down in the sequence in 
which the movements or elementary operations are to be 
performed with spaces after each in which to record the 
actual time taken in a succession of tests. One or more 
workers are then selected for timing and instructed to do 
the work or job in accordance with the sequence of ele- 
mentary operations or movements thus established and at 
a certain general rate of speed. The job is thus done, the 
time study man, watch in hand, observing and setting down 
the time taken for each element. This process is repeated 
until the time study man is satisfied that enough readings 
or performances of the operation have been observed and 
recorded for the purpose in hand. The successive readings 
or amounts of time taken in the case of each elementary 
operation are then studied and a final figure determined and 
set down which is called the "necessary time" for the ele- 
ment or the time which "should be taken." These "neces- 



44 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

sary" elementary times are added and the total is the "neces- 
sary time" for the whole operation. This, however, is not 
all the actual time allowed. To it are now added one or 
more "allowances." If the operation is strictly a hand job, 
one allowance only will probably be made to cover "fatigue," 
"necessary delays," "human necessities," and possible errors 
in the work of the observer. If the work is a machine job, 
a second allowance may be made to cover machine delays, 
breakdowns, etc. The final time set as the result of the 
study, to stand as the task time, or as representing loo per 
cent, efficiency, is the "necessary time" plus the allowance 
or allowances. The whole process will be made clear by 
reference to the form on page 45. 

This is the general process of time study which is as- 
sumed to produce an objective scientific result — to set a task 
time whose scientific accuracy and justice ^re not open to 
dispute, the time being, therefore, not a subject of bargain- 
ing, because "it substitutes exact knowledge for prejudiced 
opinion in the setting of the task." 

The slightest consideration, however, should convince any- 
one that, except possibly in the case of a machine job where 
the human element is practically negligible, e. g., where 
speed is almost purely a matter of machine capacity and 
over-speeding of the workman is impossible under any cir- 
cumstances, the process just described is incapable of pro- 
ducing the accurate result claimed, and that, throughout, 
process and results are peculiarly dependent on human judg- 
ment and prejudice. 

To make this clear, let us consider for a moment the na- 
ture of an objective scientific fact, and the conditions neces- 
sary to its establishment, and then apply these tests to the 
process of time study and task setting. An objective scien- 
tific fact is obviously something which exists quite inde- 
pendently of the observer. His sole function is to discover 
it. It is not subject to change by the will or judgment of 
the observer, and remains the same, whoever is engaged in 
the process of observation. Judgment indeed may be exer- 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 



45 



Form X.Y.Z. 45a 
TIME STUDY 

TIME STUDY NO. 



. Sheets Sheet . 



j^rticle Symbol 

Sketch or Drawing QUANTITY OPERATION 

Man No Machine No DEPT. 

Work, 'Job or Order No 

TIME A.M., P.M. 

MATERIAL OBSERVER DATE 

NOTE. — The observer must exercise extreme care in making time stud- 
ies to see that the proper sequence of operations is maintained, that all 
tinnecessary operations or moves are eliminated, that proper appliances 
are provided (including cutting tools in sufficient quantities) and that 
the proper and most economical combinations of Speed, Feed and Cut 
are used. When time is slow, due to man's natural slow moves, note 
-(in margin at extreme right below) what time should be for a fast man 
moving at his best normal speed. Have certain operations repeated if 
necessary to satisfy yourself that the time is correct and continue to 
do so until the study is satisfactory. 



Sub 
Operations 


Detailed Description of Operations, 
Speed, Cuts, etc. 


Minutes and 
Hundredths 


Average 


Should 
Take 




I 


2 


3 




I 

2 

3 

4 
5 
6 

7 
8 

9 
10 
II 
'12 
13 
14 
15 
16 

17 

18 

19 
20 
21 
22 to 46 
















Totals carried forward . . . 













FINISHED 



A.M. 
.P.M. 



ELAPSED TIME FOR 



Min. 



46 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

cised in the discovery but not judgment. which alters the 
fact itself. If the result varies with the judgment exer- 
cised by the observer and differs for each observer, it can- 
not by any stretch of truth be called an established scientific 
fact. 

In the present case, the assumed objective scientific fact 
is the time allowed the workers for doing a definite task. 
It is claimed to be a scientific fact in that it is an accurate 
scientific demonstration of what the workers can accom- 
plish without over-strain and exhaustion. But in order to 
uphold this claim it is evident that the judgment of the time 
study man must not enter into the process of its determina- 
tion in such a way as to affect the fact itself, i.e., to fix or 
alter the time of the task. His function must be purely 
that of discovery. For if he can at any point in the process 
exercise his judgment in such a way as to alter the outcome, 
it becomes at once a matter of human opinion and prejudice," 
variable for each observer, just as would be the rising and 
setting of the sun could the will and convenience of the 
observer determine their time and place. Under such cir- 
cumstances, all claims of objective scientific character would 
be lost to the results as well as all assumptions of justice 
resting upon such claims. 

But this is exactly the case with tasks set by the process 
of time study which has been described. At a score of 
points in this process, the judgment of the employer, the 
time study man or the workers may be exercised so as to 
produce variation that will affect and alter the task itself. 
In other words, the time study process includes a score of 
factors variable with the judgment and will of those im- 
mediately concerned, variation in any or all of which acts 
as a determinant of the task. This is made evident by a 
careful analysis of the process. Such analysis shows that 
among the factors that may thus vary, subject to human 
will, are: (i) The general attitude, ideals and purposes 
of the management and the consequent general instruc- 
tions given to the time study man; (2) The character, in- 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 47 

telligence, training and ideals of the time study man; (3) 
The degree to which the job to be timed and all its appurte- 
nances have been studied and standardized looking to uni- 
form conditions in its performance for all the workers; 
(4) The amount of change thus made from old methods 
and conditions of performance, e. g., the order of per- 
formance, the motions eliminated, and the degree of habitu- 
ation of the workers to the old and the new situation when 
the task is set; (5) The mode of selection of the workers 
to be timed and their speed and skill relative to the other 
members of the group; (6) The relative number of work- 
ers timed and the number of readings considered sufficient 
to secure the result desired; (7) The atmospheric condi- 
tions, time of day, time of year, the mental and physical 
condition of the workers when timed and the judgment ex- 
ercised in reducing these matters to the "normal"; (8) The 
character and amount of special instruction and special 
training given the selected workers before timing them; 
(9) The instructions given to them by the time study man 
as to care and speed, etc., to be maintained during the timing 
process; (10) The attitude of the time study man toward 
the workers being timed and the secret motives and aims 
of the workers themselves; (11) The judgment of the time 
study man as to the pace maintained under timing relative 
to the "proper," "normal" or maximum speed which should 
be demanded; (12) The checks on the actual results used 
by the time study man in this connection; (13) The method 
and mechanism used for observing and recording times 
and the degree of accuracy with which actual results are 
caught and put down; (14) The judgment exercised by 
the time study man in respect to the retention or elimination 
of possibly inaccurate or "abnormally" high or low readings ; 
(15) The method used in summing up the elementary 
readings to get the "necessary" elementary time; (16) The 
method employed in determining how much should be added 
to the "necessary time" as a human allowance; and (17) 
The method of determining the "machine allowance." 



48 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

That the factors thus enumerated are not constant in 
practice and that the tasks thus set by time study have no 
/ necessary or objective scientific relation to what the mem- 
bers of a working group can or should accomplish, but are 
dependent chiefly upon the judgment of the time study man, 
the writer can positively affirm as the result of many careful 
observations of time studies made in scientific management 
shops and much analysis and discussion of methods and 
results with scientific managers and time study men. The 
justice of this conclusion can be sufficiently demonstrated by 
further analysis in connection with one or two of the fac- 
tors involved. Take, for example, "the mode of selection 
of the workers to be timed and their speed and skill relative 
to the workers of the group." A standard task is to be set 
for all the members of the group to perform. But unless 
the time study man is to introduce the element of past ex- 
perience or to rely upon his own notion of what ought to 
be standard accomplishment, the necessary time set for all 
to attain will depend wholly on the speed and accomplish- 
ment of the men whom he selects for timing on the joS. 
But he may select the fastest men, or "good, fast" men, or 
average men, or men just below the average, or slow men, 
or any combination of these. It is all a matter of the end 
which he is seeking and of his judgment in picking men 
who can and will serve this end. If he is primarily a task- 
master, without much human understanding and sympathy, 
bent on securing the highest possible returns, he will select 
the "swifts," and if the average worker protests the task, 
he will be assured that it is an objective scientific result, and 
not subject, therefore, to dispute or bargaining. Most 
scientific managers and time study men claim that "good,^ 
average" men are selected for timing, but the truth is that 
here as elsewhere there is no high degree of uniformity. 
There can be no question that in some shops none but 
fast workers are knowingly timed, while in others it is 
equally certain that the average man is sought for this 
purpose, and, as a matter of fact, practically all the pos- 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 49 

sible variations and combinations have been found in con- 
nection with this particular matter. But the point to be 
made is that the task set is, barring other factors, deter- 
mined by what the men timed accomplish and the selecting 
of these men is altogether a matter of ideals and judg- 
ment. There is no objective scientific method of deter- 
mining what man's speed and accomplishment when re- 
corded will accurately represent the possible or just capacity 
of a heterogeneous group of workers. This can be deter- 
mined, if at all, only by the trial and error method, unless 
indeed we are to say that the scientific task is what it can 
be demonstrated that any man, arbitrarily selected, can do, 
or that if the task can be accomplished it is not too great. 

Or let us take as another example the methods of sum- 
ming up the elementary readings to get the "necessary" 
elementary time. The actual variations here are in prac- 
tice very great and are the result of the exercise of indi- 
vidual judgment. In some cases, all the figures secured by 
timing are taken into consideration. More generally, how- 
ever, the time study man begins by throwing some of them 
out. He may thus discard what he considers to be abnor- 
mally high and abnormally low readings or he may throw 
out only those which appear to be abnormally high. 

There is no fixed rule as to whether the one thing or 
the other is done or any scientific rule for determining 
what figures shall be considered "abnormal." The enor- 
mous variation which sometimes characterizes these figures 
even with the best observers ^ is sufficient indeed to indi- 
cate error of some sort, but the point above or below which 
error is assumed to exist is all a matter of individual judg- 
ment. Having eliminated the readings which he considers 

*The following figures representing the result of successive read- 
ings for a given elementary motion were copied at random from a 
time study sheet in one of the most scientifically managed shops, 
where special stress is laid on time study, and the time study men 
are selected with more than usual care: 37, 55, 50, 40, 41, 56, 52, 
60, 48, 64. 



50 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

to be abnormal, the time study man now proceeds to the 
combination o£ those which remain into one figure repre- 
senting the "necessary" time or the "time which should be 
taken" in the doing of this element of the task. Here 
again there is no fixed rule which is followed in practice 
though it is perfectly evident that any variation at this 
point means variation in the extent of the task set or the 
task time allowed. Some time study men get the "neces- 
sary" time through a simple average of the figures retained. 
Others try to find the median and assume that it represents 
the "time that should be taken." Still others plot the figures 
and attempt to determine the "average minima." Cases 
were found where faith was pinned to the most frequently 
recurring figure. Again, the lowest figure which occurred 
a certain percentage of times was selected as representing 
the "necessary time," and at times even the absolute mini- 
mum was thus taken regardless of the fact that this as- 
sumes the attention of the worker always to be focused. 
Not infrequently the results obtained by differing methods 
of this kind were compared with a figure set down as a 
check previous to the making of the time study and manipu- 
lated with reference to it. Once, a case was found where 
the summing-up process followed an arbitrary rule, the 
basis and theory of which the time study man could not 
explain. He "guessed" that the rule had been constructed 
so as to get the results which its inventor wanted. 

If space permitted, each one of the seventeen points 
enumerated above could be considered, and it could be 
shown in each case that judgment enters not only into 
determining the method pursued but as a determinant of 
the task time set. The situation is aggravated, moreover, 
by a practice which is coming into vogue of -cutting short 
or completely eliminating the elementary timing of the 
actual operation when the task is set. There are those 
who make a profession of time study and who tabulate 
for general use the elementary results. In scientific man- 
agement shops also records are kept of elementary times 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 51 

derived from their own time study work. These records 
obtained both within and without the particular shop are 
coming to be used in the setting of new tasks. Thus, when 
a new job is analyzed into its elements only those on which 
no previous record exists are actually timed. The "neces- 
sary" time is then determined by use of previously re- 
corded or elsewhere determined elementary times so far as 
they go. It thus sometimes happens that no actual time 
study is made of the particular job, but the "necessary" 
time is determined wholly by the summation of elementary 
times taken from the study of other jobs or in other shops. 
The matter, that is to say, becomes an office process. 

Now there undoubtedly exists what is sometimes known 
as a "shop constant," that is, a set of conditions which 
are peculiar to the particular shop and the particular group 
of workmen, which makes the time necessary for doing 
any particular job different from that which is necessary 
in some other or perhaps any other shop. It is not going 
too far to say that there is in some cases also a "job con- 
stant," ^ that is to say, jobs may so differ in their general 
character and relations that the time necessary to per- 
form an elementary operation common to them will differ 
with the different jobs. All this being true, it is evident 
that this curtailment of actual time study and the setting 
of tasks in one shop on the basis of time readings made 
in another introduces a further unscientific and possibly 
unjust factor into the time study and task setting process. 

In face of such evidence, which further analysis would 
multiply indefinitely, it is obviously absurd to talk of time 
study as an accurate scientific method in practice or of 
the tasks set by means of it as objective scientific facts 

*The terms "shop constant" and "job constant" are technical 
phrases which may be somewhat misleading to the lay reader. The 
conditions to which they refer would be better described perhaps 
by the terms "shop variant" and "job variant." They refer to the 
status in one particular shop or to the character of one particular 
job as against any other shop or job. 



52 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

which are not possible or proper subjects of dispute and 
bargaining. Indeed, under the general circumstances which 
prevail in industry the very conception of a single task 
set for a whole group of workers or of an invariable task 
for an individual to be accomplished from hour to hour 
and day to day is unscientific, looked at from the stand- 
point of adapting the work to the individual capacities of 
the workers or from that of strict justice. Such tasks can 
be scientific only in the sense of determining the maximum 
accomplishment of a group or of a man. For the working 
capacity of different members of a group, what different 
individuals ought to do varies, but no more surely than 
that of the individual from hour to hour and day to day. 
There is just one case in which the claim to strictly scien- 
tific results from time study and task setting can be justi- 
fied. This is where the consideration of the human factor 
can be practically eliminated. This case is exemplified in 
certain machine jobs where the output depends mainly on 
the speed and feed of the machine and the quality of the 
material, and the machine can be run at its highest capacity 
without danger of overspeeding and exhausting the worker. 
On such a job the maximum output may reasonably be 
considered the scientific task and what this is can be ac- 
curately determined by reference solely to physical and 
mathematical data. There is reason to believe that Mr. 
Taylor and his followers had in mind a job of this charac- 
ter — a machine shop proposition — when they made their 
claim to scientific accuracy and that they failed to realize 
that where the human element is introduced, as it is in 
all other circumstances, a new order of problem is created. 
The demonstration, however, of the unscientific charac- 
ter of time study and task setting does not at all prove 
that the method is necessarily impracticable or unjust to 
the workers. On the contrary, if the management is hon- 
estly seeking the best good of all concerned, and if the time 
study man is well trained, experienced, with good analytical 
ability, good judgment, and tact, there can be no question 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 53 

that time study promises much more equitable results than 
can be secured by the ordinary methods. Under such 
circumstances, it may create protective standards for the 
workers and act as a check on unreasonable and oppres- 
sive demands made by either side. Properly and fully 
applied, time study does to a very high degree substitute 
knowledge for ignorance in the setting of tasks. It thus 
opens the way for more reasonable judgments and action 
on the part of both employers and workmen. 

But it must not be forgotten that greater knowledge 
creates also greater opportunities for the unscrupulous and 
that a method, which in benevolent and intelligent hands 
makes better dealing possible, may be woefully abused by 
the ignorant and unscrupulous, and observation proves that 
time study for task setting is no exception to the rule. 

As a matter of fact, time study for task setting is found 
in scientific management shops in all its possible variations 
both with reference to methods and results. In some, the 
highest standards are maintained in regard to all the factors 
enumerated — all or a large proportion of the workers are 
timed, the largest practicable number of readings is made, 
cordial relations are established between the time study 
man and the workers, and the latter are cautioned against 
speeding up when being timed, and, if doubt remains, the 
allowances are purposely made large to cover all possible 
errors. Liberality of the task is the keynote. In other 
shops, the maximum task is just as surely sought and the 
method is warped to this end. The swiftest men are 
selected for timing, they work under special inducements or 
fear, two or three readings suffice, allowances are disre- 
garded or cut to the minimum. The task or 100% efficiency 
is to all intents and purposes arbitrarily fixed, sometimes 
practically before the time study, at what it is judged the 
workers can be forced to do. The main use of the time 
study is to prove to the workers that the task can be done 
in the time allowed. 

But consistency does not necessarily prevail even in the 



54 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

same shop. Under the same management, some of the 
jobs may be timed carefully and tasks set with care, while 
others are hastily studied and the tasks set little better 
than crude guesses. Thus, in practice, "ioo% efficiency" 
may and sometimes does mean anything from the output of 
the "swift" to a "fat job" even for the plodder. 

There is little doubt that as time goes on general improve- 
ment and greater uniformity may be expected in ideals, 
technique, and the results obtained. As things are now, how- 
ever, formidable elements stand in the way. Among these, 
two deserve some special consideration — the character and 
position occupied by the men who are being drawn into 
time study work and the practical dictates of economy. 

It should be evident from what has been said that time 
study and task setting are among the most important, if 
not the most crucial factors in the scheme of scientific 
management. Time study plays a major part in the im- 
provement of productive processes and in the standardiza- 
tion of organic and productive methods. Time study and 
task setting together are the prepotent forces governing 
the conditions of work and the welfare of the workers 
under scientific management. It is the time study man 
who determines, subject to higher sanction, the way in 
which work shall be performed, the speed at which it shall 
be done, its adaptation to the capacity of the workers, 
whether it shall be done under conditions which hamper 
or further their efiforts, whether it shall stimulate, energize, 
and develop them industrially, or narrow, degrade and ex- 
haust them. In short, it is the work of the time study 
man which chiefly determines whether efficiency shall be 
combined with just and humane treatment of the workers, 
regardful of their present and future welfare, or sought 
at their expense physically, industrially and socially. 

This being true, the time study man is, from the view- 
Fpoint of labor, the central figure in scientific management — 
its vital organ and force. To perform his functions prop- 
erly, to make scientific management tolerable to labor, he 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 55 

must be a man exceptional in technical and industrial train- 1 
ing, a man with a broad and sympathetic understanding 
of the workers as well as of the economic and social forces 
which condition their welfare, a man of unimpeachable 
judgment, governed by scientific rather than pecuniary con- 
siderations, and, withal, he must occupy a high and authori- 
tative position in the management. For if he is to set tasks 
that will not cause nervous and physical exhaustion, he 
must not only have an intimate personal knowledge of the 
work to be done, the special difficulties it involves, the 
qualities required to do it well, the demand which it makes 
on strength, skill, ingenuity and nervous force, but he must 
also be able to recognize and measure nervous disturbance 
and fatigue and understand and deal wisely with tempera- 
ment. If he is to set tasks which will always be fair and 
liberal, he must understand and know how to discount all 
the effects of current variations in machinery, tools and 
materials, in human energy and attention. If he is to safe- 
guard the lives and health of the workers and their gen- 
eral economic and social welfare, he must be an expert in 
matters of sanitation and safety, and have a broad and 
deep understanding of economic and social problems and 
forces, and, finally, if he is to make all this knowledge 
count, he must be able to establish the standards warranted 
by his study and judicial weighing of men and facts and 
to protect these standards against infringement and dis- 
placement. All this and more, if the claims of scientific 
management relative to labor are to be generally fulfilled. 

But as things actually are, this emphatically is not the 
type of man who is habitually engaged in time study work, 
and who is being drawn into it, nor does the time study 
man of the present occupy this exalted position in the 
hierarchy of scientific management. The best men in this 
work are perhaps technically qualified, but, so far as the 
observation of the writer has gone, the best of them are 
technicians with little knowledge of the subject of fatigue, 
little understanding of psychology and temperament, little 



56 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

understanding of the viewpoint and problems of the work- 
ers, and almost altogethefr lacking in knowledge of and 
interest in the broader economic and social aspects of 
working-class welfare. The bulk of the time study men 
encountered were immature men drawn from the shop or 
from college. They were expected to get their knowledge 
and training in all the matters enumerated above through 
the actual work of time study and task setting. In the 
majority of cases encountered, it was not considered essen- 
tial that they should have had any special training in the 
particular industry. A man who had worked exclusively in 
the machine shop was considered competent after a few 
weeks or months of contact and trial experience to set 
tasks in a cotton mill. Sometimes, previous industrial ex- 
perience of any kind was not considered necessary. Ana- 
lytical ability, good powers of observation, a sense of jus- 
tice and tact were the chief qualities emphasized as essen- 
tial for a good time study man. Rarely, if ever, was any- 
thing said of technical knowledge concerning fatigue, psy- 
chology, sanitation, safety, and the broader problems of 
industrial and social welfare. Indeed, time study and task 
setting were almost universally looked upon as primarily 
mechanical tasks in which the ability to analyze jobs and 
manipulate figures rather than broad knowledge and sound 
judgment were regarded as the essential factors. Natu- 
rally, therefore, the time study men were found to be 
prevailingly of the narrow-minded mechanical type, poorly 
paid and occupying the lowest positions in the managerial 
organization, if they could be said to belong at all to the 
managerial group. Nor does the situation seem to promise 
much improvement. For the position and pay accorded 
to time study men generally are such as to preclude the 
drawing into this work of really competent men in the 
broader sense. Aside from a few notable exceptions in 
the shops, and some men who make a general profession of 
time study in connection with the installation of scientific 
management, this theoretically important functionary re- 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 57 

ceives little more than good mechanics' wages, and has little 
voice in determining shop policies. The start is often made 
at $15.00 per week. A good time study man, according to 
current standards, can be had at from $75 to $100 per 
month, and $125 per month is a rather high rating for 
experienced men, if the statements of scientific managers 
are to be trusted. In fact, the time study man, who, if 
scientific management is to make good the most important 
of its labor claims, should be among the most highly trained 
and influential officials in the shop, a scientist in view- 
point, a wise arbiter between employer and workmen, is, 
in general, a petty functionary, a specialist workman, a 
sort of clerk, who has no voice in the counsels of the higher 
officials. There are, of course, exceptions to this general 
rule, but taking the situation as a whole, the quality of 
the time study men actually setting the tasks in scientific 
management shops and the position which they occupy 
are such as to preclude any present possibility of the ful- 
fillment of its labor claims. 

A less widely effective but perhaps more potent and 
permanent bar to adequate time study and the setting of 
tasks which fulfill the requirements of fair dealing and 
justice to all the workers is found in the demands of 
economy. To make a thoroughgoing study of a simple job 
so that the task may be set right with reference to the 
capacity of the workers engaged in doing it often requires 
a good deal of time study. Moreover, in connection with 
many operations performed by a group of workers, the 
conditions frequently vary not only for the whole group 
but between workman and workman engaged in it. A 
very simple illustration is found in paper cutting. With 
all the machines and appurtenances in perfect working 
order, the effort and time required to cut a ream of paper 
varies with every size of sheet to be cut. But they vary 
not only with the size, but with the quality of the paper, 
and in the ordinary printing plant many different qualities 
are cut. Obviously, if fair tasks are to be set, time studies 



58 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

must be made for each size of cut. But this alone will not 
suffice. If tasks are to be accurately set and to be not only 
accomplishable, day in and day out, but to maintain rela- 
tive justice among the workmen, time studies must be made 
and separate tasks set for each quality of paper. Other- 
wise, no workman will be sure of continuously attaining 
the task, and at the same time some will have tasks easy 
of accomplishment while others, struggle as they may, will 
not be able to come up to the standard. This situation 
becomes vitally important when it is remembered that under 
current methods of payment employed in scientific manage- 
ment shops, the worker's income is relatively high or low 
according as he succeeds or fails to make the task. But^. 
to set tasks for both size and quality would ordinarily 
mean a number of time studies in connection with this 
one operation quite impossible with any consideration for 
economy. 

Or take another illustration, the job of the make-up 
man in the same industry. It is quite economical to make 
time studies and set tasks thereon where straight-run work 
is concerned, but where cuts of various shapes and sizes 
are used, the time required to make up a form may have 
a hundred variants. But economy forbids the careful 
study of each of these in the setting of the make-up task. 

These illustrations find their counterparts in all indus- 
tries where materials vary in quality and where products 
of the same general kind made with the same machinery 
and tools are not strictly identical. 

Under such circumstances, what is classified as one job 
varies from day to day and from one workman to another. 
A single task time set on it means that the workman is 
not "paid according to his efficiency" but today gets high 
and tomorrow low wages for the same work, and that of 
two workmen at any time, one receives high reward and 
the other low for the same expenditure of skill and energy. 
Where the irregular work, as in the case of the last illus- 
tration, requires a higher than ordinary skill, the situation 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 59 

may be still more aggravated. It requires a skilled man to 
make up forms where cuts are used, but a less skilled 
workman can do the straight-run work. The skilled man 
may thus find himself failing to make the task while the 
less skilled working by his side turns out the work re- 
quired and receives the bonus reward. Such conditions 
naturally lead not only to dissatisfaction but to poor work- 
manship, and these results cannot be altogether eliminated 
by a higher day rating for the more skilled man. 

Other cases where the element of economy interferes 
with adequate time study and careful task setting are: 
orders for specialties not likely to be repeated, stock 
orders, but with variations or special attachments, rush 
orders on new lines of product, orders which require con- 
siderable experimentation or a special degree of judgment 
and skill in lay-out and work. In all such cases, tasks 
must be set, if at all, with little or no actual time study 
if delay and expense are not to spoil the market and eat 
up profits. In short, only in connection with standard 
products, requiring only moderate skill and judgment in 
lay-out and work, does economy seem to allow of ade- 
quate application of the time study method. Its natural 
sphere seems to be routine and repetitive work. 

So long, therefore, as industry continues to be the com- 
plex and diversified thing that it is, including in its range 
unskilled, routine and repetitive operations and work which 
requires on the job the highest exercise of manual skill 
and judgment, so long as it is in flux, developing con- 
tinuously new products, new modes, new machinery and 
processes, and so long as productive concerns are required 
in order to survive, to adapt themselves quickly to fluctu- 
ating market demands, this element of economy will with- 
out doubt continue to operate in a way to limit the legiti- 
mate scope of time study and task setting and will retard 
the uniform development of ideals and technique in this 
connection. 

The foregoing discussion has brought out incidentally 



6o SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

the general limitations to the legitimate application of time 
study and has suggested the difficulties attendant on at- 
tempts to set tasks by this method which shall result in 
fair conditions at all times to individual workers and as 
between worker and worker. The better class of scien- 
tific managers recognize these limitations and difficulties 
and attempt to meet them in such a way that the interests 
of their workers shall not be sacrificed. Thus, on jobs 
which are subject to great internal variations, on rush 
orders involving new work, on specialty work and highly 
skilled operations, they make no attempt at time studies 
for task setting, but pay the men by the day. Some even 
refrain altogether from time study for task setting where 
the industry is undergoing rapid change or the cycle of 
operations is very short. Recognizing the difficulties which 
are bound to arise from poor and variable materials, ma- 
chine trouble, tasks connected with the same operation vary- 
ing in difficulty, and many other current exigencies, they 
endeavor to set the task so liberally that it can be made 
under all ordinary circumstances with something to spare 
when all goes right. They attempt to do justice to the 
higher skilled workman, forced to forego the bonus, by a 
higher wage rating, and try to guard the bonus workers 
against loss, due to difficulties and delays over which they 
have no control, by allowing them to take out wait or 
delay cards which entitle them to the day wage without 
prejudice to their task time rating until they can go on 
under usual conditions. 

With the best intentions, however, the inherent difficul- 
ties of the system are not met satisfactorily. Men, espe- 
cially if highly skilled, on day work permanently are apt 
to complain when others, perhaps less skilled, pocket sev- 
eral dollars a week above their day rates, even though 
their own earnings aggregate as much or more; those who 
are shifted, today on bonus, tomorrow on day work, 
object to the uncertainty of their income; liberal task set- 
ting does not wipe out the sense of injustice when one 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 6i 

man has been forced to work as hard, barely to make 
the task, as another who passes beyond it and secures con- 
siderable extra reward; day rating during delays and in 
absence of bonus work does not compensate for lost earn- 
ings at the higher rate. Most carefully and liberally ap- 
plied, therefore, time study and task setting seem bound 
to be a source of considerable injustice and irritation to 
the workers. When we descend in the scale to employers, 
and they are not wanting, who have little consideration 
except for the returns or who look upon time study and 
task setting as a sort of religion — employers who, if econ- 
omy forbids careful work, will still go through the motions 
and set the tasks anyhow, even though they are the crud- 
est of guesses, with no carefully worked out compensa- 
tion for obvious unfairness — all these sources of uncer- 
tainty and injustice are exaggerated with the added pos- 
sibilities of over-strain, exhaustion and underpayment. 
With such possibilities in view, neither in the present nor 
in the near future is there any reasonable ground for the 
sweeping labor claims of scientific management based on 
time study as a method of task setting and efficiency 
rating. 

7. Rate Making, Modes of Payment and the Maintenance 

of Rates 

Closely interlocked with time study and task setting, both 
in the facts involved and the claims made, are the methods 
of determining wage rates and the modes of payment em- 
ployed by scientific management. These matters together 
constitute the storm center of the controversy between 
scientific management and organized labor. Our discus- 
sion must, therefore, continue for a time to be somewhat 
detailed, and at some points may seem to overlap what 
has gone before. 

The current methods of determining and paying wages 
are, according to Mr. Taylor and his associates, unscien- 



62 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

tific, unjust and destructive of efficiency. Simple pay- 
ment by the day, especially where union dictation prevails, 
is, in effect, the payment of "positions" rather than of men, 
affords little or no incentive to the individual for the 
exercise or development of efficiency, puts a premium upon 
soldiering, and causes the strong and willing to be held 
back and demoralized by the weak and unwilling. The 
piece-rate system also, as ordinarily established and admin- 
istered, falls under the same general condemnation. It has 
no scientific basis, but is determined by bargaining; it fails 
thus to furnish a just basis of payment as between man 
and man or a just division of the product between em- 
ployers and workmen; it stimulates, therefore, mutual sus- 
picion and distrust and leads, on the one hand, to limita- 
tion of output and soldiering, and, on the other, to limita- 
tion of earnings and the arbitrary cutting of rates. It is a 
prime purpose of scientific management, according to its 
highest authorities, to avoid these evils and to secure the 
full cooperation of the employees in the development of 
productive efficiency, through scientific rate making and 
modes of payment that shall remove mutual suspicion and 
distrust, furnish each individual with an adequate incen- 
tive to efficiency, guarantee justice to each and all in the 
division of the product and at the same time guard the 
worker from overspeeding and exhaustion and the degra- 
dation or elimination of reasonably efficient and willing 
men. That scientific management has succeeded in attain- 
ing these ends is the claim made by Mr. Taylor. 

In the discussion of scientific management in this con- 
nection, two distinct matters are presented for considera- 
tion. Systems of wage payment generally, beyond the uni- 
form payment by the day, week or month, and simple piece 
rates, involve two elements — the base rate sometimes called 
the "day wage," which constitutes for any group of work- 
ers the minimum earnings or indicates the general wage 
level for that group, and added "efficiency" payments which 
are supposed to represent special, additional rewards for 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 63 

special attainments. These two elements of wage payment 
are relatively independent in their mode of determination 
and effects. Each, therefore, should be considered on its 
own merits in judging the wage claims of scientific man- 
agers. 

The base rate is usually a payment per hour or per 
piece common to an occupation, operation or group of 
workers. If it is to be scientific and just according to our 
commonly accepted standards of judgment, it must be ex- 
actly equal to the value of the product created thus by the 
worker, or it must reward all workers in exact propor- 
tion to the skill and energy which they expend. That is to 
say, the base rate fixed for group A, who may be black- 
smiths, must be exactly proportioned to the value which 
this labor creates as against the value contributed by the 
capital employed, and must differ from the base rate of 
group B, say, cotton spinners, or group C, school teachers, 
just in proportion as the skill and energy expended in 
blacksmithing differ quantitatively and qualitatively from 
that expended in cotton spinning and school teaching. 
Viewed in this light, one will seek in vain for any scientific 
methods devised or employed by scientific management for 
the determination of the base rate. Close questioning 
brought out no pregnant suggestion as to how the rela- 
tive claims of capital and labor might be justly determined. 
It was claimed by some that the relative skill and energy 
employed in closely allied trades could be determined by 
comparative elementary analysis of the movements in- 
volved. But those who held to this view were forced to 
admit that where skill Is a vital factor this method breaks 
down, that there is no scientific mode of comparison be- 
tween different trades where the expenditure of effort 
differs qualitatively. As a matter of fact, the problem 
here presented would seem to be altogether new and strange 
to the majority of scientific managers, and by the best of 
them it is only vaguely comprehended. Most of those 
who are aware of it at all are possessed of a naive faith 



64 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

that in some mysterious way competition, unhampered by 
the "unnatural" efforts of labor unions, works out a just 
adjustment of absolute and relative base rates. That is 
to say, scientific management in this connection accepts 
consciously or unconsciously an abandoned theory of econ- 
omists as a common sense proposition, and practically on 
this basis rears its claims to scientific accuracy and justice 
in the establishment of wage levels. The point may seem 
overemphasized until it is remembered that inaccuracy and 
injustice in the base rate invalidate the claims to accuracy 
and justice based on the modes of payment employed. For 
efficiency rewards are reckoned in terms of the base rate. 
In justice, however, to the better-informed class of scien- 
tific managers, it must be said that no support is given 
by them to the Taylor claims in this regard. 

When it comes to the actual setting of base rates, prac- 
tically no consideration is given to a'ny theory of scientific 
accuracy and justice. The rates are fixed almost univer- 
sally with reference to the prevailing wage levels of the 
region. Generally, so far as the writer could discover, the 
attempt is to conform to the current rate. In several cases, 
higher rates were set with the avowed purpose of attract- 
ing the better workman. Instances were not wanting, how- 
ever, where minima had been established considerably above 
the normal for the region because of a feeling that prevail- 
ing rates were disgracefully low, and of a desire to raise 
them generally. Cases exist of attempts to lower the union 
scale and, as it will be seen later, scientific management 
methods, per se, have a tendency to shift workers into 
lower-paid grades, and perhaps to lower many of the rat- 
ings. Where current rates for the particular job are Jack- 
ing, that is, where scientific management through time 
study analysis creates new tasks, the new base rates seem 
to be determined partly by analogy and partly by the com- 
petitive wage that can be commanded by the class of 
workers who are to perform the new tasks. 

A significant fact in connection with the scientific man- 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 65 

agement claim of justice in rate making is that the rates 
for women relative to those of men have, in general, not 
been altered in such shops. This matter was raised on 
several occasions with scientific management employers 
without arousing any apparent sense of injustice. Indeed, 
the writer was informed by one very influential leader that 
in this connection "there is to be no nonsense about scientific 
management." "If by better organization and administra- 
tion, what is now regarded as man's work can be done 
by women, women will be employed and women's wages 
will be paid." 

The attempt to throw the glamour of science about the 
base rates fixed has called forth the charge by trade union- 
ism that scientific management tends to fix wages at their 
present low level despite the progressive advancement in the 
cost of living. There seems little, however, of practical 
validity in this idea. Scientific management shops seem as 
ready as others to raise the rates as the wage level gen- 
erally advances. The fact is that in practice there is nothing 
scientific or out of the ordinary in connection with this 
whole matter. 

When we leave the subject of base rates and turn to the 
modes of payment devised by scientific management, rela- 
tive uniformity at once gives place to bewildering diver- 
xsity with respect both to methods , and results. Each of 
the leaders, Mr. Taylor, Mr. Gantt and Mr. Emerson, has 
worked out his own particular payment scheme for satis- 
fying the demands of efficiency and just distribution. 

The Taylor payment plan is known as the "Differential 
Piece-Rate System." Under this system, in its simplest 
application, a definite task time is set for each job on the 
basis of an analysis of the job, including an elementary time 
study. Workers who fail to reach this standard are paid 
by the piece for what they do, just as in the case of the 
ordinary piece-rate system. As soon as the worker, how- 
ever, attains or exceeds the task set, a new and higher 
piece rate becomes operative. Accomplishment relative 



66 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

to the standard task may be measured by the piece, the 
hour, the day, or the week, etc. That is to say, the task 
may be so much time allowed for the turning out of a 
piece or unit of work, or so many pieces or units turned out 
per hour, day or week. In the first case, the worker is 
paid at a low rate for those pieces on which he has taken 
more than the standard time allowed, and a higher rate for 
those which he; has finished in standard time or less. In the 
second cas|> he is paid a low piece rate for the hour, day 
or week during which he has turned out less than the 
standard number of pieces, and a higher piece rate for the 
period or periods in which he has equaled or exceeded 
the task. By setting the lower piece rate below and the 
higher above current rates, the worker is stimulated to 
greater effort by prospect of both positive punishment and 
(positive reward. As Mr. Taylor says, he is at the same 
|}time pushed up and pulled up to greater efficiency. An 
example will make clear the general character and opera- 
tion of the system. Suppose current piece rates for a given 
operation are 5 cents per piece or 25 cents per hour for 
5 pieces. Under the differential piece-rate system, a stand- 
ard task of 10 minutes per piece or 6 pieces per hour might 
be set by time study. Two rates would then be estab- 
lished. Where the worker takes more than 10 minutes to 
the piece, the lower rate might be 4 cents per piece or 20 
cents per hour for 5 pieces turned out, while the rates 
where the worker takes 10 minutes or less per piece might 
be 6 cents. He would then receive 36 cents per hour where 
he accomplished the task and would be paid beyond that 6 
cents for each additional piece finished within the hour. 
Thus, his hourly rate might be 42 cents, 48 cents, or even 
more according to his ability to beat the task. The sig- 
nificant feature of the system is the sudden jump in the 
rate and pay the moment the worker succeeds in making 
the task. If, for. example, he turns out the piece in lo^^ 
minutes, he receives 4 cents for it; if he can clip ^2 min- 
ute from the time he gets 2 cents additional. Or if he 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE dj 

makes 53^ pieces per hour, he gets 22 cents for the hour, 
while if he can crowd in the other half piece and make 
it 6, he will at once raise his hourly rate from 22 cents to 
36 cents. The figures here representing the low and high 
rates are, of course, arbitrarily taken, and it is not intended 
to assert that in practice such tremendous jumps occur, 
but the principle and intent of the system are thus clearly 
illustrated. It is to be noted that under this system there 
is no fixed minimum day wage. It is evident that the prime 
purposes of such a system are stimulation of the workers 
and weeding out of the slow or unfit. This is confirmed 
by statements made by Mr. Taylor himself which are 
familiar to all students of the subject. It is hard to see 
how such a system can be made to harmonize with the 
claims that scientific management pays men in exact pro- 
portion to their efiiciency and with "exact justice," for the 
distinctive feature of this system is a Sudden large in- 
crease in reward for a very small variation in efficiency. 

MllJjantt, apparently, very early detected this incon- 
sistency and the possibilities of undue severity in the opera- 
tion of the differential piece rate system, especially as ap- 
plied to relatively unskilled workmen. He, therefore, pro- 
posed and adopted in his work what is known as the "Task 
and Bonus System" of payment. As interpreted by Mr. 
Gantt, this system rests, like the differential piece rate, 
upon a definite task set by job analysis, including elementary 
tijne -study. It ostensibly recognizes, however, but one 
piece rate as applied to each job or task. The worker 
who makes the task does not have his piece rate of pay 
raised directly, but receives an additional reward in the 
form of a bonus. Moreover, the worker who fails to 
make the task is not openly punished, but is protected by 
what amounts to a minimum wage. However slight the 
accomplishment compared with the task, the worker is 
guaranteed the base rate or day wage which has been 
established for that class of work. That ig, he receives as 
a minimum what would be coming to him if he made the 



68 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

task and were paid at the regular piece rate. The worker 
I who makes the task at once receives a bonus reckoned 
tin additional hours or fractions of an hour paid at the reg- 
lular rate, and for all accomplishment above the task, the 
ibonus pay is increased in proportion to the time saved. 

Thus, suppose the standard rate set is 5 pieces per hour 
and the piece rate is 5 cents per piece. The standard 
hourly rate would then be 2$ cents, and if the 9-hour day 
exists, the standard day wage would be $2,25. Under this 
system, every worker employed at this particular job or 
task would get as a minimum $2,25 for the day whatever 
number of pieces he turned out under 5 pieces per hour 
or 45 per day. It might be only 4 to the hour or 36 to 
the day, but he would still get his minimum wage of 
$2.25. The bonus is fixed in percentage terms. Suppose 
it be 30% and reckoned by the hour. Then the moment 
a worker makes his hourly task, i.e., succeeds in turning 
out 5 pieces in the hour, he is credited with a bonus of 30% 
or 18 minutes. That is to say,- he is allowed payment at 
the ^standard rate of 25 cents per hour for one hour and 
18 minutes or 32^ cents. If he beats the task and turns 
out, say, 6 pieces instead of 5 in the hour, the bonus pay 
increases proportionately to the time saved. That is, he 
would then receive pay at the regular rate for one hour 
and one-fifth plus the bonus of 30% in time, or pay for 
72 plus 21.6 minutes or 93.6 minutes, which wo,uld amount 
to 39 cents for the hour's actual work. 

As we have said, the Gantt system ostensibly recog- 
nizes but one piece rate for the job, the "efficiency" re- 
ward being in the form of a bonus of additional standard 
time allowed, paid for at the regular rat-es. If the analysis 
be carried further, however, and the hourly rate of the 
worker who makes the task be compared with the number 
of pieces turned out, it is seen that the actual piece rate 
advances above that in terms of which the payment is cal- 
culated and tlj^t with a given percentage of bonus it 
thereafter remains constant whatever number of pieces the 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 69 

worker may turn out. To make this clear, let us revert to 
the examples just given, where the standard task set is 5 
pieces per hour, the piece rate 5 cents per piece and the 
bonus 30%. If, under the circumstances, the worker makes 
5 pieces in the hour or equals the task, he is allowed, as we 
have seen, payment at the standard rate for one hour and 
18 minutes or $.325. The actual piece rate paid is, then, 
6y2 cents instead of 5 cents. Now continuing the calcu- 
lation, if he turns out 6 pieces in the hour, he is allowed pay 
at 25 cents per hour for 93.6 minutes or 39 cents or actually 
6^ cents per piece; if he makes 7 pieces, he is paid at 
the regular rate for 109.2 minutes or $.455 which is again 
equal to an actual piece rate of 6^ cents, and so on in- 
definitely. In other words, when the Gantt system is care- 
fully analyzed, it is seen to be really a differential piece-rate 
system but with a minimum guarantee which, on accom- 
plishment below the standard task, has the effect of increas- 
ing the piece rates as the accomplishment falls off. 
J The distinctive features, then, of the task and bonus 
system, as worl^ed out by Mr. Gantt, are : A definite task' 
set on the basis of job analysis, including elementary time 
study ; a guaranteed minimum day wage which amounts to I 
current wages for those who fail to make the task; high 
piece rates for inefficient workmen, diminishing as actual 
accomplishment approaches the task; a sharp advance in 
the rate of pay per piece and the wages per hour or day 
at the moment of making the task ; after which, the method 
of payment becomes in fact a straight piece-rate system. 

The special virtue of the Gantt system is the guaranteed 
minimum day wage which enables beginners to subsist on 
their earnings while learning to perform the operations. 
Beyond- this, the actual liberality of the method depends, of 
course, upon the task which is set and the percentage of 
bonus allowed. There is nothing, except the impossibility 
of retaining workers (which seems to count for little in fact) 
to prevent the task being set so high that few, if any, 
workers can habitually reach it, and the bonus percentage 



70 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

can be made so low that the extra reward amounts to 
little. The facts o£ the matter we shall note later. Lib- 
erally applied, the system is without doubt very advan- 
tageous to the poorer and to the better workers. The for- 
mer get at least current day rates; the latter, who may be 
supposed to attain or beat the task, secure a high piece 
rate. But for the workers in between, those who can turn 
out a fairly good amount of product but who still cannot 
reach the standard task, the system may be both unjust 
and inhibitive of efficiency, for such workers cannot by 
|any increase of exertion increase their wages, and the more 
effort they put forth, resulting in increased output, the 
less becomes their actual piece rate payment. -Both on this 
account and because also there is here at the point where 
bonus begins a sudden large variation of payment for a 
slight variation in efficiency, the Gantt system, in common 
with the differential piece rate, definitely violates the prin- 
ciple of payment in exact proportion to efficiency. 

Mr. Emerson ~~objects to the Gantt system as' especially 
rewarding the worker "only when He hits the bull's eye." 
He claims that men should be rewarded ^or all^hots that 
hit the target anywhere within the outer circle. In other 
words, he wishes to avoid /^ the suddeli jump in, wages 
characteristic of the Taylor and Gantt systems at the" ipq- 
ment when the worker reaches a certain arbitrary standard 
of efficiency, and to give him special' inducement and spe- 
cial compensation for increase of efficiency anywhere along 
the line above the tolerable minimum of work and output. 
This he seeks to accomplish by establishing an efficiency 
sc'ale for each job or class of work instead of setting a 
single standard task, and by paralleling^ this efficiency scale 
by a minutely graded series of premiums or bonuses, be- 
ginning at what is considered the minimum that ought to 
be accomplish^ by any^ worker and advancing progres- 
sively as efficiency advances^ up ^o ioo% of achievement 
after which the premium advance is constant. As in the 
Gantt system, the work is first classified by occupations or 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 71 

jobs, and a base rate or day wage — usually so much per 
hour — is fixed for each class of work. This base or hourly 
rate is received by each worker doing the given class of 
work regardless of his efficiency or output, and is the basis 
on which premiums are calculated. That is to say, the 
premium is a certain per cent, of the hourly wage. The 
hourly rate itself is determined by the current wage of the 
locality for the given class of work. Like the Gantt sys- 
tem, then, the Emerson plan begins by guaranteeing to the 
worker the current rate of day wages as a minimum. The 
efficiency scale for each class of work is determined as in 
the standard task under the Taylor and Gantt systems, by 
job analysis, including elementary time study, and to all 
intents and purposes 100% efficiency under the Emerson 
plan may be said to correspond to the standard task under 
the other systems. Premium payments begin somewhere 
above 50% efficiency or one-half the standard task, usually 
at 66^%. In other words, the worker who turns out 
what amounts to, say 67% of the standard task or 100% 
efficiency gets his regular day' wages or hourly rate, plus 
a/«lighi; additional reward called a "premium" or "bonus." 
As his output advances above this, or approaches 100% 
of accomplishment, the day wage or hourly .rate remains 
always the same but the premium or bonus increases not 
only absolutely tjut at a progressive rate, till at 100% 
efficiency, it reaches, according to the standard , Emerson 
table, 20% of the day wage or hourly rate. Thereafter, 
every increase of 1% in efficiency carries with it ah in- 
crease of 1% in premium, that is, i% of the day wage, the 
standard hourly - rate remaining always the same. The 
method of premium gradation may perhaps be*sufficiently 
illustrated ty reference to the following^ premium or bonus 
table used quite generally in Emerson shops. 

In actual practice, there is a good deal oftVariation, both 
in respect to the percentage of efficiency at which the 
premium payments begin, and in the minuteness of, the 
gradation of the premium payments, below 100% efficiency. 



73 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 
Bonus Table 



Per Cent. Efaciency 


Bonus 


Per Cent. Efficiency 


Bonus 


67 


.005 


84 


•05 


68 


.005 


85 


•05 


69 


.005 


86 


.06 


70 


.005 


87 


.07 


71 


.005 


88 


.08 


72 


.005 


89 


.09 


73 


.01 


90 


.10 


74 


.01 


91 


.11 


75 


.01 


92 


.12 


76 


.02 


93 


•13 


77 


.02 


94 


.14 


78 


.02 


95 


•15 . 


79 


•03 


96 


.16 


80 ' 


•03 


97 


.17 


81 


•03 


98 


.18 


82 


.04 


99 


.19 


' 83 


.04 


100 


.20 



For each one per cent, above 100 per cent, increase the 
bonus of $.2p.per $1.00 of wages'by $:oi./' " ■ ' . 
^ Standard hours -f- actual hours ±= efficiency %. ■ 

1. A bonus is paid on the hour rate' in return for production, 
so that if the employee produces at the rate of 100% efficiency 
based on a standard time as predetermined by investigation and 
time study, showing what the normal operative is capable of 
producing, he will receive the hour rate and an increase of 20% 
on this rate, which is his bonus for efficiency. 

2. Changes in conditions, such as improved tools, special 
fixtures, etc., which permit of increased production not due to 
the skill of the employee, require a new standard. 

3. The employee will receive^ the additional wage or bonus 
for approaching, equaling or doing better than a standard day's 
work, based on the average efficiency of the week and day rate 
per hour, according to the table on opposite side of card. 

4. Extra time. for fatigue, delays, etc., has been allowed in 
the standard time; therefore, no extra time will be allowed 
for delays due to failures of belts, repairs to equipment, etc. 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 73 

The so-called actual efficiency of the worker, and so the 
premium to which he is entitled, is determined by compar- 
ing the standard time for turning out a given amount of 
work, i.e., the time which represents 100% efficiency, with 
the actual time taken to do the work, the formula being: 
Standard hours -f- actual hours = efficiency per cent. 
That is to say, a man who is working at 100% efficiency is 
credited with delivering a standard hour's work in an actual 
hour of time. If he is working at less than 100% effi- 
ciency, he delivers in the actual hour less than a standard 
hour's work. Dividing the standard hours of work actually 
delivered by the actual time taken to deliver them gives the 
efficiency of the worker compared with 100%.. Thus, sup- 
pose a job has been subjected to time study and the stand- 
ard hour's work, i.e., 100% efficiency, has been fixed at 100 
pieces. A actually turns out 90 pieces in the hour; B, no 
pieces. A has delivered ^"/loo standard hours in one hour, 
S "°/ioo standard hours. A's efficiency will be 90% ; B's 
efficiency 110%. The premium paid workers who are 90% 
efficient" is, according to^the table here shown, 10% of the 
"day wage- or hourly r&te,»that paid to workers iio^ efficient 
is 30% of the hourly rate. Assuming then the day rate for 
this class of, workers to be 25 cents per hour, A would 
receive for his hour's work 25 cents plus 2^ cents or 
$.275. B would get 25 cents plus 7.5 cents or $.325. Under 
this system, the efficiency o'^f the worker and the premium 
due him may be reckoned by the hour, day, week or month. 
Mr. Emerson advocates efficiency rating on the average 
accomplishment over a fairly long period of time in order, 
as he says, that a worker may make up on one day for low 
efficiency on another, and avoid the discouragement of a 
total loss of premium payment when circumstances within 
or beyond his control happen for short periods to be against 
him. The tendency is to rate efficiency on the basis of 
fairly long periods, thus simplifying record-keeping and 
accounting. The possible disadvantageous results from this 
to the worker will be noted later. 



74 SCIEN^Tlhc MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

|. Aj; first blusl^ the Emerson system seems to be liberal to 
tne workers and to avoid the fundamental errors. of ilhe 
iTaylor and Gantt systems, viewed from the standpoint of 
the labor claims of scientific management. It guaran- 
tees current wages to all workers continued in employ. ' It 
i avoids at any point a great variation in payment for 3. 
I slight ■ variation in efficiency. Further analysis, however,' 
I shows that this system does 'not pay workers in exact pro- 
's portion to efficiency, and that^ in fact, the more efficient a 
worker becomes the' less pay he gets per unit of output. 
The very poor worker, who, nevertheless, receives full day 
rates, is paid at a much higher piece rate than the more 
efficient man w^ gets a slight premium, and piece rates 
diminish continuously after the premium point is reached 
in spite of the progressive increase in their amount. This 
may be shown by working out a concrete example. Sup- 
pose the base rate to be 25 cents per hour, and 100% effi- 
ciency to be 10 pieces per hour. Let the premiums begin 
at 6y% efficiency and be graded according to the Emerson 
table. Then, at 66% efficiency, the worker will turn out 
6.6 pieces, for which he will be paid 25 cents or a piece rate 
of $.0379. At 62% efficiency, he will get 25 cents plus 
$.00125 or $.25125, or at the rate of $.0375-!- per piece; 
at 75% efficiency the piece. rate will be $.0336+; at 90% 
efficiency, $.0305+; at 100% efficiency, $.03; at 110% effi- 
ciency $.0295-]-; at 120% efficiency $.0291-!-. That is, 
under the Emerson system, the worker, where material con- 
ditions remain constant, gets a constantly diminishing return 
for extra exertion while the employer stands to gain as the 
worker's efficiency increases, not only because of the dimin- 
ishing wage rate but because of the lessened overhead per 
unit of product as the output increases.* 

* Of course, where increased output is due wholly to better or- 
ganization or equipment, it may result without increased exertion 
on the part of the worker or even with less exertion. Under these 
circumstances, a diminishing piece rate need carry no implication 
of injustice. 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 75 

Still, the Emerson system may be very liberal to the 
worker if what is assumed to be 100% efficiency is set 
at a comparatively low point. This, of course, is an en- 
tirely arbitrary matter as our analysis of time study has 
shown. It may be, as Mr. Emerson says, "50% of the out- 
put of a fast man," or it may be 100% of this output or 
the output of a good, fast man, or an average man, or the 
average of a group or anything else according to the charac- 
ter and disposition of the employer and the time study 
man. There is no absolute 100% determined by man or 
nature. 

Such are the systems of payment devised by the leaders 
of the schools of scientific management under considera- 
tion. None of them, except the differential piece rate, 
makes it clear that scientific management intends to pur- 
chase labor by specification. All of them definitely belie 
the claim that scientific management pays workers in exact 
proportion to their efficiency. One of them has the obvious 
intent of weeding out the lower grade of workers, while 
the other two are so constituted as to make such workers 
very unprofitable to the employers. Two of them may 
lend themselves to the exploitation of mediocre workers — 
those who can deliver a medium output but cannot attain 
to' a standard task set high. All of them furnish a strong 
stimulus to high efficiency and output, but in themselves 
furnish no apparently effective check on overspeeding and 
exhaustion. All of them are capable of being liberally 
applied, but all can also be used as instruments of oppres- 
sion through the undue severity of task setting or effi- 
ciency rating, for we have seen that no claim of scientific 
accuracy can be made in this connection, and Mr. Taylor's 
statement that unfairness in this respect will at once result 
in a falling off of the worker's efficiency, and that, therefore, 
employers must be fools to practice it, is not borne out by 
the hard facts, especially where workers are unskilled and 
unorganized, and Mr. Taylor, himself, has relegated most 
employers to the category named above. 



76 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

Finally, all of the systems tend in their direct effects to 
center the attention of the worker on his individual in- 
terest and gain and to repress the development of group 
consciousness and interest. Where the work of one man is 
independent of that of another, the individual has no mo- 
tive to consider his fellow since his work and pay in no 
wise depend on the other man. What either does will not 
affect the other's task or rates. Where work is interde- 
pendent, the leader cannot afford to slow down to accom- 
modate his successor and the follow-up man has no motive 
except to keep his fellow up to the mark. 

It must be admitted that these systems are admirably 
suited to stimulate the workers, but in so far as there 
may be virtue in the union principles of group solidarity 
and uniformity, and in so far as the systems lay claim to 
scientific accuracy or a special conformity to justice in 
reward, they must be judged adversely. 

But it would be a gross mistake to assume either that 
no other than these methods of remuneration just de- 
scribed are in use in scientific management shops, or that 
where these methods are adopted, they are of necessity 
rigidly adhered to. As a matter of fact, the possible vari- 
ants in modes of "efficiency" payment are many, and the 
actual situation presents a welter of diversity. Numerous 
other "efficiency" systems have been devised by minor lead- 
ers and independent systematizers, some of which have 
found their way even into Taylor, Gantt and Emerson 
shops. Students of the subject are familiar with the Halsey 
premium plan, and the Wier, Rowan, Cardullo and Vicar- 
Maxon systems, to name only a few. A considerable vari- 
ety of modifications and combinations of the three standard 
methods described has also been found possible, and those 
which have proved advantageous in the eyes of particular 
managements or systematizers have been put into opera- 
tion. At the same time, few, if any, scientific manage- 
ment shops have found it desirable to discard altogether 
the older modes of payment. Day work is almost always 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE ^7 

retained for the most highly skilled tasks and for work 
not easily standardized. It is also generally resorted to in 
emergencies, e.g., in the case of rush orders, on new models, 
and when breakdowns and interferences with routine work 
occur. It. is likely to prevail in any work not yet time- 
studied and standardized, because of lack of time or the 
dictates of economy. Usually, therefore, there is a very 
considerable amount of it even in highly systematized shops. 
Straight piece work is also surprisingly prevalent, some 
highly commended shops showing no disposition to re- 
place it for certain classes of work. Indeed, the unmodi- 
fied and strictly applied Taylor, Gantt and Emerson sys- 
tems can hardly be said to be the typical modes of pay- 
ment in scientific management shops. The Taylor dif- 
ferential piece rate system is infrequently encountered. In 
most of the so-called Taylor shops, its place has been taken 
by some form of the task and bonus system. In one or 
two of these shops, highly commended by Mr. Taylor, a 
single piece rate system is found, based on tasks set by 
time study, and accompanied by a minimum guarantee for 
beginners which gradually diminishes as the term of service 
lengthens, and, finally, disappears at the end of the "appren- 
ticeship" period. One shop paid by the piece with a profit- 
sharing dividend at the end of the year, graded by the 
class of work and the individual records of the workers. 
The task and bonus system is largely used, but shows a 
variety of departures from the straight Gantt method. A 
striking example is the differential task and bonus found 
in two of the shops studied. This appears to be a cross 
between the Gantt and Emerson systems. A standard task 
is set but bonus payments begin at, say, 80% of this task, 
and are graded up to the full 100% task. Different methods 
of reckoning the bonus have also been devised which 
vitally affect the outcome to the workers without appar- 
ent modification of the original task and bonus system. 
Thus, in some cases, the worker does not receive a bonus. 
reckoned in hours, but is paid for the number of hours 



^ 78 SCIENTII^IC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 
« ■ , 

actually worked; plus a bonus on the accomplishment of 
the task, i.e., if the worker accomplishes a lohour task 
in 8 hours, he- gets paid at the regtilar rate for 8 hours 
only, plus a -bonus on the lo-hour task accomplished. This 
means a diminishing piece rate as the output increases above 
the task. 

^he Emerson system probably prevails more widely than 
the other two, and when it is installed, more fully displaces 
rival modes of payment. It is also apparently less subject 
to ^modification. But variations in this system and its effects 
are produced by varying the percentage of efficiency at 
, which {he premium payments begin, by differences in the 
gradation of the premiums, by variation in the amount of 
output rated as 100% efficiency, and by variation in the 
grounds for the payment or withholding of premiums. 

In aH the systems of "efficiency" payment, the element 
of quality enters with quantity into the determination of 
the awards to be made, and other factors may affect the 
results to the workman. Vanous supplemental additions 
and various causes for deductions may thus become in- 
volved in the calculations. The whole situation, more- 
over, is complicated, and the effects of the systems upon 
the wage workers are modified by bonus and premium 
■ payments, calculated in various ways and paid for various 
reasons to a larger or smaller number of managerial func- 
tionaries, principally gang foremen or functional foremen 
of various kinds. Sometimes the principle of bonus or , 
premium payment is extended to all sorts of persons and 
acts. One case, even, was found where the gang foreman 
received bonuses varying directly with the accomplishment 
of the machine workers under him, while the time study 
man was paid bonus going up as the "efficiency" of the 
shop decreased. 

The bonus system is also complicated in its effects by 
the payment or non-payment of it to helpers in gang work. 
In fact, once the principle of "efficiency" payments is 
recognized, there is an infinite number of ways in which 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 79 

it may be worked out and applied with results, to the 
Workers dependent entirely upon the designs of tHc' indi- 
vidual administrations. ' * u 
It would obviously be impossible in this stu3y to/exmain 

, the character and implications of all these systems^df pay- 
ment and to enter into a detailed discussion of the possi- 
ble and actual effects of all the detailed variatipns'_jand '■ ^ 
modifications of them. Most of the "indqpencjent"' sys- ;^ 
terns and most of the general modifications and combina- ' '' 
tions of the Taylor, Gantt, and Emerson plans seem to 5e1i ' 
devised so as to lower the piece rate or labor cost as the 

^GUfput and efficiency of the workers increase. Doiabtless ' ' 
ithe detailed variations are sometimes designed to better, the-, 
^working conditions and wage results but doubtless^also, 
the opposite is often the case. To trace out the effects' of 
the various permutations under diverse circumstances would 
itself require a volume. Neither is it possible in the space 
allowed to describe and evaluate the various combinations 
of payment methods actually employed in the shops visited. 
The purposes of this study will doubtless be sufficiently 
served by merely indicating some of the major conditions 
and results which have been found to exist, which bear espe- 
cially on the claims of scientific management and the 
charges made by trade unionism against it. 

Aside from the criticisms which may be brought to bear ^^ 
directly upon the modes of payment found in scientific 
management shops, the chief dangers to labor, exposed as ^ 
it is to all the intricate complexities and possible variations 
of the situation just described, where several systems of 
payment are often conjointly employed, and the worker 
sometimes finds himself working now under one, and now 
under another, when various persons in authority may be 
pecuniarily dependent on the accomplishment of the indi- 
vidual worker and various grounds may be assigned for the 
payment or withholding of rewards, seem to be that the 

workers may not be regularly assigned to accomplishable 

tasks, that their work and income may be shifting and 



8o SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

uncertain in amount and that the rates of pay may be indi- 
rectly, but none the less certainly, juggled. 

Scientific management, it is true, makes a special point 
of claiming virtue in connection with all these matters. 
According to the Taylor claims, scientific management 
assigns to each workman a definite and, by him, accom- 
plishable task, increases the security and continuity of 
employment and prevents arbitrary rate cutting. 

There is little doubt in the mind of the writer that 
scientific management, if fully and properly applied in har- 
mony with the Taylor methods and ideals, would do much 
toward attaining these ends. Careful and thorough time 
study for task setting, though it of necessity falls short 
of scientific accuracy, does tend to set up definite and 
known standards of accomplishment. And there is no 
question that the establishment and recognition of such 
standards have in themselves a tendency to check attempts 
on the part of employers to gain an advantage through 
arbitrary alteration of the tasks and thus the indirect cut- 
ting of the rates. If the time study is not only thoroughly 
and carefully done, but is liberal in its intent, it does fur- 
nish a real basis for the assignment to all workers of 
definite and accomplishable tasks. And if in connection 
with such time study, the general work of improvement 
and standardization, of planning and routing, and of sales 
organization, has been well accomplished, the possibilities 
of improvement in steadiness and continuity of employ- 
ment cannot be denied. But, in the situation which actually 
exists, with its frequent neglect of adequate systematization, 
with time study often hastily done, or neglected, and espe- 
cially with all this variation in modes of payment and 
shifting combinations of payment systems, there is no doubt 
that special opportunities exist for taking advantage of the 
workers with respect to the tasks set, the stability of em- 
ployment and the rates actually paid for work done. That 
the workers do sometimes suffer in all these respects, 
whether from the purposeful efforts of employers or the 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 8i 

normal effects of the systems and combinations of payment 
employed, the present investigation has furnished suffi- 
cient evidence. A few cases in point will be enough for 
illustrative purposes. It is not intended to assert that 
these cases are typical, or to imply that any number of 
scientific management shops present the conditions that 
make them possible or natural except where they grow 
directly out of time study. It is simply desired to show 
what may and sometimes does occur as the result mainly 
of modes of payment which may be employed under scien- 
tific management. 

It is admitted generally by scientific managers that at 
the outset the average worker cannot attain the task or 
100% efficiency, and so get the advantage, or the full advan- 
tage at least, of the "efficiency rewards." A certain period 
of instruction, training or habituation is required for this. 
The claim is generally made, however, that this period is 
short, a few days or a few weeks at the most. Where the 
tasks are set liberally and the workers are kept continu- 
ously at the particular operation, this should probably be 
true. But there is no guarantee that there will be liberal 
task setting, and especially in shops where production is 
not mainly for stock, and the character and volume of the 
orders shift continually, the mass of the workers cannot 
be employed continuously on one job or task, or even 
under one system of payment. Day work frequently alter- 
nates with task work and sometimes the tasks shift so 
that the worker is hardly habituated to one before another 
takes its place. It may thus happen that a group of work- 
ers may go on for months never securing enough con- 
tinuous work in one particular task so that the majority 
of them become skilled enough to make it habitually and 
secure the bonus payments. Or they may no sooner become 
proficient in one task before another is substituted, and the 
process of learning must be gone through with again. 
Where such situations exist, it has been found difficult to 
secure records sufficiently accurate to warrant generaliza- 



82 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

tions, but the possibility here presented is evident, and the 
reality of it has been proved by the examination of par- 
ticular record sheets. Again, though the work may be 
fairly continuous on one job, the task may be -set so high 
that months rather than days or weeks may be required 
to attain it, and even then only a minority may succeed 
in this. In one shop, highly commended by a well-known 
and highly respected leader of the movement, the writer 
was able to trace the record of a small group of workers 
for a period of seven months. At the beginning of this 
period six old workers were employed at the task, all of 
them habitually making the task. New workers were 
added to the group from time to time, seven all told. Of 
these new workers, all but one dropped out during the 
period of seven months. Most of these workers never suc- 
ceeded in making the task, or made it only here and there, 
for a day or two at a time. Only two became proficient 
enough to make it habitually. One of these dropped out 
early. So that at the end of the seven months, one per- 
manent task-making worker had been added to the group. 
The investigator was informed by the shop authorities that 
thi^ group had nothing about it that was exceptional. In 
the cases just cited, the workers who failed to make the 
task were paid at day rates. In one sense, therefore, they 
cannot be said to have suffered. In view of such instances, 
however, and the possibilities thus presented, the claim that 
scientific management assigns to each worker a definite 
and by him accomplishable task must be taken with con- 
siderable reservation. Moreover, it is to be kept in mind 
that such workers are not paid in exact proportion to their 
efficiency since the nearer they approach to the task with- 
out making it, the lower their wages become, reckoned in 
piece-rate terms. 

Generally also, and especially in shops of this kind where 
the character of the product varies greatly and work is 
done mainly on special orders rather than for stock, the 
systems of payment devised by scientific management seem 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 83 

to work directly against stability and continuity of employ- 
ment. Not only must there be a strong tendency to weed 
out the less efficient workers where, as under the premium 
system, the piece rate diminishes all along the line with 
the , increase of productivity, or where, under task and 
bonus, the workers who conspicuously fail to make the task 
receive very high piece rates, but under all these systems 
and especially under task and bonus, the workers are nat- 
urally pressed to dispose, as soon as possible, of all the 
work on hand regardless of what may be in sight for the 
future. When work is slack there is little chance for them 
to "nurse the job," as under the day and piece-rate sys- 
tems. As inducement to keep the workers hustling, the 
employer has not only to consider overhead expenses, but 
also the fact that under most of these systems letting down 
in individual accomplishment means a definite and known 
increase in the piece rate paid, and where this is not the 
case, the task, itself, becomes a sort of fetish-. There is 
a strong tendency then, under all these systems of payment, 
to keep the workers going at top speed as long as the 
work lasts, and then to send them home or lay them off; 
or where this is not done, they are put temporarily on 
day work. In the one case, continuity of employment is 
sacrificed, in the other, stability of income.^ Nor is it 
merely the employer who, under these systems, is moved 
to contribute to instability and discontinuity of employ- 
ment, but also the workers themselves who are straining 
after bonuses or premiums. During the past winter of 
depression, the writer has thus had the opportunity of ob- 
serving piece workers who were obviously nursing their 
jobs, while near them bonus workers were still going at 
the standard speed. This, however, is not always the case. 
The investigator has also been in scientific management 
shops where, in spite of the natural effects of the modes 
of payment, the pace had, with the full approval of the 

^ The writer, In making this statement, means to imply nothing as 
to the social justice or injustice or desirabiUty of this situation. 



84 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

employers, been relaxed in order to tide the, workers over 
the slack period. The modes of payment are, of course, 
only one factor entering into the determination of security 
and continuity of employment under scientific management. 
Further consideration of this matter must, therefore, be 
reserved for separate treatment. 

The matter of rate cutting is also something not entirely 
dependent on modes of payment. These, however, with 
time study, are perhaps its chief determinants. It can, 
therefore, be properly disposed of at this point. With 
reference to the maintenance of rates under scientific man- 
agement, a somewhat equivocal situation seems to exist. 
The almost universal declaration of scientific management 
experts and shop managers is that rates once established are 
never altered. To substantiate this claim, several cases 
were pointed out where tasks had obviously been set very 
low through mistake, and rates, therefore, very high, mak- 
ing what are known as "fat" jobs, and where, nevertheless, 
the original situation was maintained. It was explained 
that to cut even such rates would rouse suspicion among 
the workers and destroy the good will necessary to high 
efficiency generally. The writer believes it to be a fact that 
scientific management has fostered the idea that rates 
should not be cut, and that there is much in the ideals and 
general theory which, when fully applied, should have a 
tendency to improve the situation greatly in this respect, as 
compared with what habitually obtains in the average un- 
organized shop. Perhaps the chief causes of rate cutting, 
as things now exist, are ignorance as to the possibilities of 
increased production through improvements in the material 
equipment and the organization of the shop, and cut- throat 
competition resulting from the lack of exact knowledge of 
productive costs. In so far, then, as scientific management 
succeeds in showing the way to improved methods and or- 
ganization and better methods of cost accounting, it prom- 
ises, thus, to eliminate the chief existing causes of rate 
cutting. That it is making progress in this direction there 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 85 

can be no doubt. Nevertheless, to say that rates under 
scientific management are never cut and to assume that the 
whole influence of scientific management is in the direction 
of maintenance of rates would be patently opposed to the 
facts. Rates are rarely, if ever, cut openly in scientific 
management shops, but the payment methods employed, to- 
gether with the methods of setting tasks, lend themselves 
readily to indirect cutting, and there is no doubt that what 
is openly decried is sometimes accomplished by indirection. 
Time study analysis can almost always be used to alter 
in some degree the nature of the task or of the product. 
When this has been done, a new task can be set, and a 
new rate established without ostensible violation of the 
scientific management principle of maintenance of rates, 
and often without the knowledge of the workmen. On 
the "new" task, also, a new efficiency rating may be placed 
and lower actual rates thus set. It is to be noted that 
Mr. Taylor allows for such rate alteration in his statement 
of scientific management claims. "Under scientific man- 
agement," he says, "the rate is never cut without an absolute 
change in the directions governing the work and the time 
demanded for doing it." What constitutes an absolute 
change in directions or in the character of the product is 
capable of very liberal interpretation by scientific managers, 
as was proved by actual experience during the course of 
this investigation. The discovery through time study of an 
"unnecessary" motion and its elimination, the gearing up 
of a machine, or the increase in the number of cutting 
points, a slight change in the tools, jigs or materials, an 
equally slight change in the shape or size of the product or 
in the method of handling it — any of these things may be 
.sufficient to satisfy the conditions laid down by Mr. Taylor 
to allow of a change in task time, without constituting a 
rate cut. By an extension of this method, entirely new 
classes of work can be readily created, unskilled tasks 
lopped ofif from skilled work and given a new and lower 
rating, still without cutting the rate. It is the very essence 



86 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

of scientific management to make such improvements 
wherever possible, and while good managers, who have the 
welfare of the workers at heart, endeavor to see that 
workers shall not thus be made to suffer, unscrupulous 
employers are not slow to take advantage of these means 
to demote workmen and lower actual wage rates. Herein 
lies, perhaps, the chief bane of scientific management from 
the viewpoint of organized labor. Under cover of the 
incentive offered by premium and bonus payments, work- 
men can be induced to acquiesce in changes made thus 
gradually in the habitual work and rates to the destruction 
of all union standards established or the possibility of 
establishing them. The different systems of payment, also, 
would seem to afford special possibilities and inducements 
for manipulating the conditions of work and the actual 
rates of the workers. Thus, for example, the differential 
piece rate and the task and bonus systems would seem to 
hold out special inducements to employers to keep the stand- 
ard task so high that few workers can attain it, and to 
shift those about to reach it to new lines of work. The 
Emerson premium plan, where efficiency is rated on the 
average of the week's or fortnight's work, would make it 
seem profitable to shift the work when the indications were 
that the operative, if left to the original task throughout, 
would attain to a very high degree of efficiency and pile 
up very high premiums. Charges of this character have 
been made freely by representatives of labor, but this inves- 
tigation has resulted in the securing of no unequivocal 
evidence in justification of these charges in the shops in- 
vestigated. Before passing finally on this matter further 
investigation will be necessary. 

There can be no doubt that under scientific manage- 
ment rates are cut. But to say positively that scientific 
management, on the whole, furthers the cutting of rates, 
is quite another matter. The fact seems clear that at 
this point there is a conflict of tendencies within the thing 
itself. There is strong inducement for scientific managers 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 87 

to maintain rates strictly and the honest efforts of those 
who deserve the name so to maintain them can hardly be 
impugned. At the same time, however, the greatest ad- 
vance toward efficiency, for which scientific management 
stands, is obtained by the constant alteration of conditions 
and tasks through time study. Such alterations almost of 
necessity mean constant indirect rate cutting. Should in- 
dustry cease to be in flux, i.e., should it become standardized 
for good and all, scientific management would undoubtedly 
operate as an unequivocal force tending to the maintenance 
of rates. As it is, with industry in flux, what amounts to 
rate cutting seems to be almost of necessity an essential 
part of its very nature. 

8. The Protection of Workers from Over-exertion and 
Exhaustion 

Scientific management, according to Mr. Taylor, guards 
the workers against overspeeding and exhaustion nervously 
and physically. It does this, we are told, with a conscious 
view both to efficiency and the welfare of the workers, and 
as the result of many, characteristic devices and effects of 
scientific management — by standardizing equipment and 
performance and, thus, by tending to prevent ignorance in 
bidding and cut -throat competition; by substituting exact 
knowledge based upon a careful study of men and machines 
for guesswork in the setting of the task and the determi- 
nation of the hours and other conditions of work; by 
careful studies of fatigue and the setting of the task on 
the basis of a large number of performances by men of 
different capacities, and with due and scientific allowance 
for the human factor and legitimate delays ; by removing, 
thus, the suspicions of the employers that the workers are 
soldiering, and eliminating the need for pace setters ; by 
turning speeders into instructors and transferring respon- 
sibility from the workers to the management for contriving 
the best methods of work; by removing from each worker 



88 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

responsibility for the work of others and for the instruction 
of beginners and helpers ; by maintaining the best condi- 
tions for performing work through furnishing the best 
tools and materials at the proper time and place; by train- 
ing the workers in the most economical and easiest methods 
of performing operations ; by instituting rational rest pe- 
riods and modes of recreation during the working hours,, 
and by surrounding the workers with the safest and most 
sanitary shop conditions. 

An ideal is here presented which, in its mere expres- 
sion by the most influential leader of the new movement, 
constitutes a strong count in favor of scientific manage- 
ment. Mr. Taylor has, without doubt, put his finger upon 
the chief causes of overspeeding and has pointed out effi- 
cient means for safeguarding the workers against it and 
its evil effects. Unfortunately, investigation indicates that 
scientific management, in practice, furnishes no reasonable 
basis for the majority of these specific claims in the pres- 
ent, and little hope for their realization in the near future. 
The previous discussion has shown that, in practice, stand- 
ardization of equipment and performance is frequently 
neglected; that time study, as practiced, falls far short of 
substituting exact knowledge for guesswork in the setting 
of the task; and that proper instruction of the workers is 
often lacking. It follows logically and in fact that the sus- 
picions of the employers that the workers are soldiering are 
not always removed, and the apparent need for pace setters 
not always abated, and that speeders are not always turned 
into instructors; that the best conditions for performing 
the work through furnishing the best tools and materials at 
the proper time and place are not always in evidence, and 
that the workers are not always trained in the most eco- 
nomical and easiest methods of performing operations. In 
these matters, indeed, the utmost variation prevails in 
scientific management as in other shops. Several admirable 
cases were found with respect to all these matters, but 
shops were not wanting where the management exhibited 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 89 

the utmost suspicion of the workers, referring continually 
to their disposition to "beaLthe^time study man," where 
the time study was obviously based on the work of speeders 
and all sorts of inducements were offered for pace setting, 
where instruction and training of the workers was empha- 
sized by its absence, and where the general conditions of 
work were much in need of improvement. There remain, 
then, in this connection but a few of Mr. Taylor's specific 
claims for discussion. 

The first of these relates to the hours of labor. Mr. 
Emerson asserts that scientific management has nothing 
directly to do with this matter, that this is a moral ques- 
tion. The facts secured in this investigation seem to show 
that, practically, scientific management has not materially 
affected the length of the working day. Aside from shops 
where the management was evidently imbued with a strong 
moral sense, the hours of labor in scientific management 
shops were those common to the industry and the locality. 
Theoretically, perhaps, cogent arguments could be brought 
forward to show wherein diverse factors in scientific man- 
agement tend both to the lengthening and the shortening of 
hours of work. But for present purposes, it is sufficient 
to let the facts speak for themselves. 

A much more definite issue is brought up by Mr. Taylor's 
claim that scientific management guards the workers against 
overspeeding and exhaustion through careful studies of 
fatigue and the setting of the task on the basis of a large 
number of performances by men of different capacities and 
with due and scientific allowance for the human factor and 
legitimate delays. It has been pointed out already in the 
discussion of time study that tasks are set in all sorts of 
ways, with reference to the men chosen and the number of 
performances timed. There is no general rule. And it was 
also demonstrated that no scientific method has been de- 
veloped for the making of human allowances, and that 
these are sometimes very liberal, but sometimes also unduly 
curtailed. It must be admitted, on the other hand, that 



90 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

scientific management can and often does go far, through 
the study of machinery and the careful observation of the 
on-going process of production, toward the estabhshment of 
proper allowance for legitimate delays, not connected di- 
rectly with the human factor. When we come, however, to 
the matter of fatigue studies and their connection with 
speeding and exhaustion, Mr. Taylor's claim seems to break 
down completely. No scientific fatigue studies were found 
taking place in the shops, and the time study men employed, 
who should be charged with such studies, seemed, in gen- 
eral, to be quite indififerent or quite ignorant in regard to 
this whole matter. Fatigue studies, apparently, are not 
' t&dde when the tasks are set, and if, afterwards, complaint 
*is made, the classical method of dealing with the subject 
is to "demonstrate" to the worker that the task can be done 
in the time set. Efforts to discover from scientific manage- 
ment experts proper methods for studying fatigue brought 
out only vague replies. Were it not for certain examples 
cited in scientific management texts, there would seem to 
be no grounds for crediting it with any scientific aspira- 
tions in this connection. This does not mean that no atten- 
tion to fatigue is given in scientific management shops. 
Cases were found where the health and energy of the 
workers were carefully observed and attempts were made 
to adapt the work to their condition, but the methods em- 
ployed were the rough and ready ones of common sense 
observation. 

Where standardization and instruction are not properly 
carried out, it is obviously out of place to talk of trans- 
ferring from the workers to the management responsibility 
for contriving the best methods of work, and removing 
from each worker responsibility for the work of others and 
for the instruction of beginners and helpers. Doubtless, 
scientific management shops, as a whole, are more advanced 
in these respects than the ordinary run of establishments, 
but there are those where the worker contrives much that 
is credited to the management, and where beginners and 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 91 

helpers are largely or wholly dependent on their fellow 
workers for suggestions and assistance. 

Rest periods and modes of recreation during the work- 
ing hours have been tried out in some scientific manage- 
ment shops and abandoned. They are a regular institution 
on an extended scale in one shop visited by the writer. 
Special cases were encountered elsewhere, but managers, in 
general, apparently do not even entertain the idea of their 
institution. 

Finally, scientific management does not always surround 
the workers with the safest and most sanitary shop condi- 
tions. The writer was unable to secure accident statistics 
sufficiently comprehensive to warrant a generalization based 
on them as to the effect of scientific management in prac- 
tice on the safety of working conditions, and a projected c 
comparative health examination of employees was found^ 
impracticable for lack of a sufficient number of subjects . 
suitably situated. The writer was forced, therefore, to 
depend mainly on observation and questioning rather than 
on scientific data both as to safety and sanitation. In gen- 
eral, stientific management shops seem to be good shops 
as shops go. The introduction of the system has the ten- 
dency without doubt to clean the shop up and to improve 
the conditions of belting, machinery and arrangement of 
material equipment generally. All this is in the direct line 
of efficiency and safety. Several very notable examples of 
excellence in safety and sanitation were found. On the 
other hand, several shops visited were below good stand- 
ards in these respects, and flagrant specific violations of 
safety rules were encountered. In general, there seemed 
to be two very distinct classes of shops in respect to these 
matters — extremely good and very ordinary. 

Reviewing as a whole the evidence bearing on the specific 
claims relative to speeding and exhaustion, it is very evi- 
dent that the main contention of Mr. Taylor is not war- 
ranted by the facts. They in no wise justify the assump- 
tion that scientific management offers any effective guaran- 



92 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

tee against overspeeding and exhaustion of workers. The 
writer has a strong impression that scientific management 
workers, in general, are not overspeeded, but Mr. Taylor's 
challenge to show any overspeeded or overworked men 
in scientific management shops is very easily met. The 
situation, in this respect, varies much with the industry. 
Some instances of undoubted overspeeding were found, par- 
ticularly in the case of girls and women. But these in- 
stances do not warrant a general charge. On the other 
hand, there appears to be nothing in the special methods 
of scientific management to prevent speeding-up where the 
technical conditions make it possible and profitable, and 
there is much in these methods to induce it in the hands of 
unscrupulous employers. 

p. Opportunities for Advancement and Promotion 

A great deal is said by Mr. Taylor and his associates of 
the opportunities offered the workers under scientific man- 
agement for advancement and promotion. The way is 
opened for all of them to become "first-class men." They 
are stimulated to this by the systems of efficiency payment 
which furnish immediate rewards for increased or im- 
proved output. The record of each man is known to the 
employer so that no one can be held back by prejudice 
or favoritism. Functional foremanship creates many new 
and advanced positions not heretofore within the reach of 
shop workers. The way to the top, therefore, is always 
open for the man of energy and ability. 

The picture is an attractive one, but, in fact, is blurred by 
several facts and circumstances. In the first place, as we 
have seen, scientific management often fails in the develop- 
ment of functional foremanship, and in the elimination of 
favoritism. Secondly, it tends to create a multitude of new 
tasks on which less skill is required and lower rates can 
be paid; has developed no efficient system for the placing 
or adaptation of the workers; is inclined, in practice, to 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 93 

regard a worker adapted to his work and rightly placed 
when he succeeds in making the task; tends to confine the 
mass of the workmen to one or two tasks, and has afforded 
little opportunity, therefore, for the discovery and develop- 
ment of special aptitudes among the mass. Moreover, 
careful record-keeping and the knowledge which it conveys 
to the management have their disadvantages as well as ad- 
vantages, looked at from the viewpoint of advancement. 
The employer is loath to take a worker from a task where 
he is making a high efficiency record, and the man or woman 
whose record is not good is more surely destined to a less 
skilled and perhaps narrower task. The fact is that scien- 
tific management, in practice, has the tendency to divide 
the workers into two unequal classes — the few who rise to 
managerial positions, and the many who . seem bound to 
remain task workers within a narrow field. In this, it 
does not differ essentially from the ordinary modern indus- 
trial organization based on machine production, except that 
perhaps the differentiation is more quickly and surely at- 
tained. This, of course, depends on the degree to which 
and the accuracy with which the principles and methods 
are applied. In this, as we have seen, there is an extreme 
of diversity. 

Granting, however, that scientific management does not 
and cannot create advanced positions for the mass of the 
workers, and often fails to make of them "first-class men," 
even in the narrowest sense of the term, it is argued that 
it tends to recruit the higher positions from within the shop 
and more surely to detect and reward special merit through 
the close association that exists between the management 
force and the wage workers, and the rewards which it of- 
fers for meritorious suggestions. There is no doubt a 
great deal of truth in this argument when scientific man- 
agement is Ideally applied, and, in practice, the writer be- 
lieves it to be a fact that the office and managerial staff is 
drawn more largely from the shop workers in scientific 
management shops generally than in ordinary establish- 



94 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

merits. Often, however, this is not the case; the minor 
functionaries, especially time study men, being drawn 
largely from sources outside the shop and the industry.^ 
Even when it is true, the advantage to the mass of the 
workers is sometimes more apparent than real, the man- 
agerial material being drawn from a special class of work- 
ers trained for this end from the beginning. Moreover, 
while the development of functional foremanship does cause 
an intermingling of minor officials and workmen in their 
regular duties, there is a good deal of nonsense talked about 
the close touch which exists between the managers and the 
men. From recent magazine articles, one might be led to 
believe that the "front office" is the habitual resort of work- 
men in trouble or with suggestions to make. This has not 
been the experience of the investigator. The front office 
may always be open, but workers rarely take advantage 
of the fact for reasons that will presently be explained. 
There is a great deal of exaggeration, too, in statements 
made concerning special rewards for usable suggestions. 
Few of the shops make any systematic rewards of this 
kind and where this is the case the awards are usually 
trivial and may be very inadequate compared with the real 
value of the suggestions to the management. The writer 
saw in one shop an automatic machine invented by a work- 
man which did the work of several hand workers. "Did 
he received any reward?" was the question asked. "Oh, 
yes," came the answer, "his rate of pay was increased from 
17 to 22 cents an hour." Instances of this kind could be 
multiplied. ^ 

On the whole, it seems reasonable to conclude that, fully 
and properly applied, scientific management more surely 
and speedily separates the efficient from the inefficient work- 
ers, and affords speedier and more certain promotion and 
advancement to the former than management of the ordi- 
nary kind. It cannot, however, greatly enlarge the field 

^It is, of course, desirable that time study men should be men of 
broad training and experience. See pp. 54-57. 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 95 

for promotion compared with the great number of the work- 
men, and, in practice, the methods of promotion and ad- 
vancement vary greatly in character and merit with the 
individual shop management. 

10. The Modes of Discipline 

The methods and severity of discipline supposed to be ' 
characteristic of scientific management have come in for an 
immense deal of acrimonious criticism from the representa- - ^ 
tives of organized labor. Unnecessary managerial inter- 
ference by a host of petty officials present in the shop is - 
assumed by them to be applied at every point of the work 
and at every moment of the day. A multiplicity of new 
offenses is supposed to be created by task setting and the 
intricate modes of payment, and fines and docking are pic- 
tured as falling upon the workers at every failure to meet 
the severe tests and intricate arrangements of the system. 
Mr. Taylor, on the other hand, and scientific managers gen- 
erally, claim that .scientific management lessens the rigors 
of shop discipline mainly because each worker is set to a 
simple and definite task, and is stimulated by the method 
of payment to do his best in the prospect of individual 
gain. Under these circumstances, it is urged that tardiness, 
irregularity, soldiering and poor work are automatically 
regulated, the officials are relieved from the necessity of 
personal supervision, threats and punishments in order to 
keep the individual up to the mark, and are free to become 
helpers and instructors. Shop discipline in the old sense is 
thus practically eliminated. 

In theory, the scientific managers would appear to have 
the best of the argument, and the writer was agreeably 
struck by the absence^ in practice, of rough and arbitrary 
disciplinary authority. When the tasks were liberally set, 
the workers were found generally operating without special 
supervision except where instructions or assistance were 
needed. Deductions were indeed made for poor work and 



96 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

destruction of materials, and punishments meted out for 
ordinary breaches of discipline, but in the better class of 
shops apparently with no greater and perhaps with less 
than ordinary severity because of the dependence placed 
on the stimulating prospects of efficiency payments and the 
necessity for keeping the workers hopeful in order to reap 
their full benefits. 

Shops were found, however, where the tasks were set 
high, and the driving principle prevailed. Here supervision 
was more intensive than that found in the ordinary estab- 
lishment. The individual worker who was behind in his 
task was kept constantly reminded of the exact extent of 
his demerit, and punitive devices were multiplied to insure 
his promptness, his regularity and the quantity and quality 
of his performance. 

In general, it would seem that scientific management does 
lessen the rigors of discipline as compared with other shops 
where the management is autocratic and the workers have 
no organization and no voice in determining the conditions 
of work and the disciplinary code. On the other hand, it 
creates the possibility of great disciplinary severity and re- 
finements. Much depends upon the character of the indus- 
try, the competitive conditions, and the spirit of the indi- 
vidual management. This fact lays it open, perhaps, to 
legitimate union criticism as uncontrolled from below, 
though the evidence produced by this investigation as to 
the actual conditions favors, on the whole, the scientific 
management contention. 

II. Methods of Discharge and the Length of Service 

With respect to discharge and the length of service, the 
study in hand has brought out nothing to distinguish scien- 
tific management as unique, but much to indicate that it has 
developed in practice no consistency of methods, results or 
perhaps even tendencies. While discharge is generally an 
act of managerial discretion, uncontrolled and uninfluenced 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 97 

by the body of workmen, its grounds and the specific au- 
thority for it vary from industry to industry, and from shop 
to shop. Where a separate labor bureau exists, its chief 
official is generally charged with a review and recording of 
the attendant circumstances, but he rarely has any final 
authority. This sometimes rests with the superintendents, 
sometimes with the foremen. 

It was generally declared that the discharged workman 
has a right of appeal to the highest shop authority, and that 
as the result of such appeals reinstatements often occur. 
But in general, superintendents seem chary of interfering 
with what has been the prerogative of the gang foreman. 
They may assign the workman to another department, but 
it would appear that he is rarely put back into his old 
position without the consent of the foreman in charge. 

The grounds of discharge seem to be those current in 
ordinary shops, but apparently more attention is given to 
the workers' productive record. This tends perhaps to 
render the efficient workman's position more secure, but 
more speedily weeds out the inefficient. The more careful 
keeping of records, especially in regard to the worker's 
former employment and character, doubtless tends also, as 
the unionists declare, to the development of something re- 
sembling a blacklist, but this affects hiring more than it 
does the matter of discharge. That the change in methods, 
however, due to time study, results sometimes in the elimi- 
nation of whole classes of workers, the evidence proves, as 
will be shown in a later section. Leaving this matter aside, 
the extent of discharge seems to depend here as elsewhere 
on industrial conditions and the motives of the particular 
management. That men are always thrown out as soon 
as they have passed their prime was disproved by the pres- 
ence in several shops of old men far beyond their period 
of greatest usefulness. Many scientific managers claim that 
average length of service is longer in their shops than else- 
where and that the yearly turnover of labor is less. To 
support these claims, considerable statistical material was 



98 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

collected, but in few cases was it possible to secure statisti- 
cal evidence broad enough or going far enough back in the 
history of shops to afford a safe basis for generalizations 
as to the effect of scientific management. Enough data were 
secured, however, to show that in respect to length of serv- 
ice and labor turnover, the greatest variations exist in 
Scientific management shops as in those outside, dependent 
mainly on the industry and the general industrial condi- 
tions. Annual labor turnovers as low as io% were claimed 
md as high as ioo% or over were admitted. As we shall 
see later, however, the characteristic methods of scientific 
management tend to make possible the very quick replace- 
ment of the wage-working force. The whole matter, how- 
ever, is one in which neither management claims nor union 
complaints seem susceptible of proof except that the unions 
seem to charge legitimately that discharge is generally a 
matter of arbitrary managerial authority. 

12. Scientific Management and Industrial Democracy 

Not less important than the controversy that centers about 
time study and the modes of payment employed by scien- 
tific management is that which concerns its general demo- 
cratic or autocratic character and relations to the workers. 
|d)rganized labor declares that scientific management is es- 
ISentially autocratic — a reversion to industrial autocracy, 
'which forces the workers to depend upon the employers' 
conception of fairness, and limits the democratic safeguards 
of the workers. It tends to gather up and transfer to the 
management all the traditional knowledge, the judgment 
and the skill of the workers, and monopolizes their initia- 
tive and skill in connection with the work; it ordinarily 
allows the workmen no voice in hiring or discharge, the 
setting of the task, the determination of the wage rate or 
the general conditions of employment; it greatly intensifies 
unnecessary managerial dictation and discipline, tends to 
prevent the presentation and denies the consideration of 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 99 

grievances, and tends to increase the number of shop of- 
fenses and the amount of docking and fining; it introduces 
the spirit of mutual suspicion and contest among the men 
and thus destroys the solidarity and cooperative spirit of 
the group; it has refused to deal with the workers except 
as individuals ; it is incompatible with and destructive of 
unionism; it destroys all the protective rules established by 
unionism; and, finally, it is incompatible with and destruc- 
tive of collective bargaining. 

Mr. Taylor, on the other hand, claims that scientific 
management is the essence of industrial democracy. It 
substitutes the rule of law for arbitrary decisions of fore- 
men, employers and unions, and treats each worker as an 
independent personality; it transfers to the workers the 
traditional craft knowledge which is being lost and destroyed 
under current industrial methods ; lessens the rigors of shop 
discipline; promotes a friendly feeling and relationship be- 
tween the management and the men, and among the work- 
ers of the shop or group ; it gives a voice to both parties — 
to the workers equal voice in the end with the employer — 
and substitutes joint obedience to fact and law for obedi- 
ence to personal authority. No such democracy has ever 
existed in industry before. Every protest of every work- 
man must be handled by those on the management side 
and the right or wrong of the complaint must be settled, 
not by the opinion either of the management or the work- 
man, but by the great code of laws which has been de- 
veloped and which must satisfy both sides ; both can refer 
only to the arbitrament of science and fact. Scientific man- 
agement thus makes collective bargaining and trade union- 
ism unnecessary as means of protection to the workers, 
but it welcomes the cooperation of unionism. 

It is evident that we have here two distinct conceptions 
of industrial democracy, and that the failure of the Taylor 
group and unionists to agree as to the character of scientific 
management in this respect results largely from the fact 
that neither party has grasped the viewpoint of the 



100 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

other. Each argues the matter in terms of his own concep- 
tion, assuming this to be common to both, each arrives thus 
at conclusions necessarily opposed to the other, and each, 
therefore, wonders at the stupidity or intellectual dishonesty 
of the other, perhaps without just cause. 

Mr. Taylor conceives of the industrial situation as one 
in which the relations between employers and workers are 
governed by a fundamental harmony of interests. This 
being assumed, perfect equality between them and complete 
democracy in all their relationships is to be sought in sweep- 
ing aside the personal authority of the employer and the 
arbitrary rules and regulations of the workmen with all the 
machinery for negotiations and the enforcement of de- 
cisions created by both, and substituting in all matters the 
impersonal dictates of natural law and fact. It i s the de- 
mocracy of science as applied to industry. All that is 
needed to realize this is to have in the shop a corps of 
scientists to determine and declare to employers and work- 
ers the objective scientific facts. If Mr. Taylor's original 
assumption is correct and if all industrial matters touching 
the relations of employers and workmen have been or can 
be reduced to a purely scientific basis, his conception of 
industrial democracy is valid, and if it is adhered to by 
scientific managers generally, the worker has no need of 
unions, union machinery or collective bargaining to voice 
his complaints and enforce his demands in order to secure 
just consideration of his interests and equal voice with the 
employers in the determination of all matters of mutual 
concern. 

The trade unionists, on the other hand, conceive of the 
industrial situation as one in which the interests of the 
employers and workmen are fundamentally opposed, at 
least as concerns the division of the product and the con- 
ditions of work that relate themselves closely to this. The 
employer, therefore, seeks naturally to take advantage of 
the worker. Individually, the latter is helpless. As one 
man, his voice can have no influence in determining vital 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE loi 

decisions which affect his interest, and to raise it alone 
can only bring down upon him suspicions and penalties. 
The only way, therefore, to secure real democracy in in- 
dustry with just treatment for each and all is through the 
organization of the workers and the establishment of defi- 
nite rules and machinery for the voicing of complaints and 
the consideration of grievances ; in short, the organization 
of unions and the practical recognition of the principle of 
collective bargaining. If the fundamental union assump- 
tion is sound in practice or if, being unsound, scientific man- 
agers do not generally hold to the Taylor conception or 
have failed to discover and put into practice generally 
methods for determining exactly what each man can or 
ought to do, for rewarding each man exactly according to 
his efficiency, and for the selection and adaptation of work- 
ers — methods, scientific in their character, uninfluenced as 
to the results by personal prejudice or fallible human judg- 
ment, expressions of objective fact, in short — then the con- 
ception of Mr. Taylor must for practical purposes be set 
aside, and the democratic or autocratic character of scien- 
tific management must be judged by the degree to which 
it furnishes the workers individually and collectively the 
opportunity of directly expressing and enforcing their 
viewpoint as against that of the employer, and of pro- 
tecting their standards of work and pay against his possible 
aggression. 

In considering the democracy of scientific management, 
then, we must first determine how far the Taylor concep- 
tion is realizable and actually realized in practice, and if 
it appears to be a Utopian dream, however worthy it may 
be as such, we shall be forced to render a decision based 
on the degree of truth in the trade union charges. 

On the fundamental question of the harmony or opposi- 
tion of interests between employers and workers, the writer 
cannot hope to contribute anything decisive. The individual 
must here be left to his own judgment, which will doubtless 
be the result of his training and associations. It is a fact. 



102 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

however, that the Taylor view and his conception of de- 
mocracy are by no means universally accepted by scientific 
managers. In this respect, roughly speaking, two general 
classes o£ managers were found — those who expressed a 
belief in harmony of interests and in industrial democracy, 
and those who, to all intents and purposes, take the trade 
union view that a fundamental contest necessarily exists 
in industry between the employers and the workers over 
the division of the product, and, in respect to all the condi- 
tions bearing upon this, that the workers are not only 
ignorant of what constitutes good industrial practice, but 
insatiable in their demands, and that, therefore, harmony 
of interests and democracy in industry are notions which 
it would be folly for the practical business man to entertain. 
Most of those even who expressed belief in the ideals of 
harmony and in the democratic principle were far from 
being willing to go the whole route and put into practice 
the democratic deductions of the Taylor concept. They 
believed in harmony of interests, they were enthusiastic 
about industrial democracy, they would readily consent to 
the workers having a voice in this, that, and the other vital 
matter, some of them would even let the workers decide on 
standards of work and rates of pay; as a matter of fact, 
they never did anything directly touching the workers' in- 
terests without consulting and advising with them indi- 
vidually or en masse, in short, they were thoroughly demo- 
cratic, but in the end, it was generally found that the 
democracy of these men had a string attached to it. They 
would, of course, want to reserve the right of veto where 
the workers were governed by improper motives, too much 
influenced by trade unionists or manifestly wrong. The 
final decision must of necessity rest with the employers. 
That is inherent in business. In short, the democracy of 
this class of scientific managers usually turned out to be on 



analysis a species of benevolent despotism, often very 
worthy indeed, but far removed from the Taylor concej>-~ 
tiqn in jts scientific purity. 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 103 

But quite aside from the actual ideals held by scientific 
managers, the preceding discussion, especially that which is 
concerned with time study and task setting, the modes of 
payment, the selection and adaptation of the workers, the 
means for guaranteeing them against overspeeding and ex- 
haustion, and the character of time study men, should be 
decisive with respect to the practical validity of Mr. Tay- 
lor's conception of industrial democracy, as exemplified by 
scientific management. Scientific management in respect to 
these matters has evolved no methods of determining ob- 
jective scientific fact, and has established no natural laws 
to which both sides must or can refer for arbitrament, 
equally binding upon both and through which, therefore, in 
the end the worker is given equal voice with the employer. 
In all these matters, the judgment of the employer or his 
agent determines the outcome, where no rules or machinery 
exist through which the men may express and enforce their 
ideas of truth and justice, and the agents of the employers, 
the time study men, as we have seen, are usually not fitted . 
to stand as unbiased arbiters between employers and work- 
men — as the unimpeachable upholders of scientific fact and 
law in the midst of a struggle for personal gain. 

We need not then concern ourselves further with Mr. 
Taylor's conception of democracy in this connection. It is 
a noble ideal, as old at least as St. Simon, and the time may , 
come when it will be capable of realization. Before this, 
however, the science of psychology must make long strides, 
industry must attain a much greater degree of regularity 
and stability than at present exists, and the type of man : 
who is supposed to discover and voice the dictates of 
science^^and stand thus as the just judge between employers 
and workers — must be very different from the present gen- 
eral run of time study men and task setters. The practical 
decision, then, as to whether scientific management is auto- 
cratic or democratic in its relations to the workers must 
turn on the degree to which it gives the workers power 
and opportunities, as compared with the employers, to 



104 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

express and advance their viewpoint and enforce their de- 
mands. 

There can be little doubt that scientific management tends, 
in practice, to weaken the power of the individual worker 
as against the employer, setting aside all questions of per- 
sonal attitude and the particular opportunities and methods 
for voicing complaints and enforcing demands. As we have 
seen, it gathers up and transfers to the management the tra- 
ditional craft knowledge and transmits this again to the 
workers only piecemeal as it is needed in the performance 
of the particular job or task. It tends, in practice, to con- 
fine each worker to a particular task or small cycle of tasks. 
It thus narrows his outlook and skill and the experience 
and training which are necessary to do the work. He is, 
therefore, more easily displaced. Moreover, the changing 
of methods and conditions of work and the setting of tasks 
by time study with its assumption always of scientific ac- 
curacy put the individual worker at a disadvantage in any 
attempt to question the justice of the demands made upon 
him; and the assumed payment of wages in exact propor- 
tion to efficiency, with the opportunities of exceptional re- 
ward held out if he will but make the task, tends to put 
upon him responsibility for wage results of which he com- 
plains. There are no simple, definite, recognized and per- 
manent standards of work and earnings to which he can 
appeal. The onus of proof is upon him and the standards 
of judgment are set up by the employer, covered by the 
mantle of scientific accuracy. The unskilled worker, espe- 
cially, under scientific management, loses what little chance 
of success as an individual he may elsewhere have in any 
contest with the employer, and scientific management, from 
the viewpoint of competitive power, tends to relegate work- 
ers to the condition of the unskilled. 

It would seem, also, that scientific management tends, on 
the whole, to prevent the formation of groups of workers 
within the shop with recognized common interests, and to 
weaken the solidarity of those which exist. Scientific man- 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 105 

agement, it is true, claims the opposite effect. The develop- 
ment of group feeling is fostered by the removal of irrita- 
tions caused by soldiering and poor workmanship, the em- 
ployment of pace makers, rewards not based on efficiency, 
and favoritism shown by the old line foreman. Unques- 
tionably, irritations thus caused do interfere with group 
solidarity, but, as we have seen, scientific management in 
practice does not always remove them. The man timed on 
the job is in effect a pace maker and sometimes consciously 
such. Where the task is set high, follow-up workers com- 
plain that their predecessors scamp the work in their ef- 
forts to secure the bonus and that the inspector does not 
always discover the fact. This is a form of soldiering quite 
as irritating as that found in the old line shops. Favoritism 
is not always eliminated, especially where the foreman is 
paid a bonus on the work done under him. It is doubtless 
true that the methods of payment employed by scientific 
management result in wage rewards within the group more 
nearly in proportion to efficiency than under the day wage 
system, but, as a source of irritation in this connection, 
nothing could be devised more potent than the sudden jump 
in rates which takes place under the Taylor and Gantt sys- 
tems, when the task is made. _.The worker who just misses 
the task has ample cause^for irritation when hi_s. neighbor 
attains it perhaps through^ some favoring circumstance, or 
because he has succeeded in evading the vigilance of the 
inspector, or because the time studies have not been thorough 
_enough to make proper allowance for differences in the skill 
_^required or the materials used on the same "job." Workers 
questioned in regard to the irritations within the group 
under the new and the old systems differ greatly in their 
replies. The writer is inclined to the opinion that, liberally 
and thoroughly applied, scientific management would tend 
to remove the irritations cited. As scientific management 
is practiced, no safe generalizations can be made in this 
connection. 

But this does not by any means dispose of the main ques- 



io6 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

tion whether or not scientific management has the effect 
of furthering or promoting the formation of working groups 
within the shop capable of effective united action. Beyond 
the question of irritation is that of the general effect of 
scientific management methods on the motives and atti- 
tudes of the workers. Here the count seems to be de- 
cidedly in favor of the trade union charges. Almost every- 
thing points to the strengthening of the individualistic mo- 
tive and the weakening of group solidarity. Each worker is 
bent on the attainment of his individual task. He cannot 
combine with his fellows to determine how much that 
task shall be. If the individual slows down he merely less- 
ens his wages and prejudices his standing without helping 
his neighbor. If he can beat the other fellow, he helps 
himself without affecting the other's task or pay. Assist- 
ance, unless the man is a paid instructor, is at personal 
cost. Special rewards, where offered, are for the indi- 
vidual. The chance of promotion is supposed to depend 
on the individual record. Rules of seniority are not recog- 
nized. Sometimes personal rivalry is stimulated by the 
posting of individual records or classification of the workers 
by name into "Excellent," "Good," "Poor," etc. Poten- 
tial groups are broken up by the constant changes in meth- 
ods and reclassification of workers which is the mission of 
time study. The whole gospel of scientific management 
to the worker is to the individual, telling him how, by spe- 
cial efficiency, he can cut loose from the mass, and rise in 
wages or position to a man of consequence. Only by the 
welfare work outside the working hours is there anything 
done to bring the men together. But once seated at the 
bench or machine, they are so many individual atoms, each 
dependent on his own exertions for the position he shall 
occupy in the heap. Decidedly, then, scientific management 
does not tend to the development of group solidarity within 
the shop. 

With the power of the individual weakened, and the 
chances lessened for the development of groups and group 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 107 

solidarity, the democratic possibilities of scientific manage- 
ment, barring the presence of unionism, would seem to be 
scant. The individual is manifestly in no position to cope 
with the employer on a basis of equality. Collective bar- 
gaining directly by the men employed is, under the circum- 
stances, almost unthinkable. Unless, then, scientific man- 
agement has evolved and put into practice something to 
offset this manifest weakness of the individual and the 
shop group in their dealings with the employers, or holds 
itself ready to cooperate with unions outside, it cannot by 
any stretch of the imagination be called democratic. As a 
matter of fact, Mr. Taylor and some of his associates claim 
virtue for scientific management in both these respects : 
Scientific management is democratic in that it lessens the 
number of shop offenses, and the rigor of discipline, and 
because it produces a constant close association between 
the representatives of the management and the men and 
gives full opportunity and encouragement to every indi- 
vidual to make suggestions and to voice his complaints. 
Every avenue is open to him for this, beginning with the 
most minor functionary, on up to the individual who sits in 
the front office, which is always open to the humblest mem- 
ber of the shop force. All complaints are heard and if the 
man can prove his case, the remedy is always forthcoming. 
If this is not democracy in industry, where can it be found ? 
We have already considered the matter of shop discipline 
under scientific management, and have concluded that, on 
the whole, the claim is warranted in practice. This, how- 
ever, is a minor matter in the present connection. We have 
also touched upon the closeness of association under scien- 
tific management between the management and the men, and 
concluded that while there is something in this claim, a good 
deal of nonsense is talked and written about it. Shops 
vary greatly in this respect and, so far as this investigation 
shows, the higher officials are often as far removed and in- 
accessible to the employees as in the case of the old line 
"autocratic" establishment. Granting, however, an open 



io8 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

road for the worker to the employer himself and no obstruc- 
tion to the making of suggestions and the voicing of com- 
plaints, let us see what this actually amounts to in practice 
in terms of industrial democracy. Here we must deal first 
with the exceptions, and then with the mass of scientific 
management shops. The writer has been in one or two 
shops where the manager so thoroughly understood the 
workers and the shop conditions, was so thoroughly fair- 
minded, and had installed such thoroughly efficient ma- 
chinery for the voicing and consideration of complaints that 
the writer could not doubt the practical democracy of the 
arrangements and the outcome. In all the other shops, 
however, he could see no foundation for the democratic 
claim based on the opportunities offered for voicing com- 
plaints and the consideration given to them. In a number 
of shops, the managers were found to be thoroughly auto- 
cratic in attitude. Complaints were heard, but they were 
settled on the basis of the rules and principles laid down 
by the employer or the records based on them. A complaint 
about the task, for example, would be settled by explaining 
to the worker how it was set, or by showing him that it had 
been done or demonstrating to him that it could be done. 
Other employers frequently yielded to the demands of the 
workers, but as a matter of grace. Even where the man- 
ager was open-minded and thoroughly democratic in senti- 
ment, it sometimes turned out that he could not understand 
the viewpoint of the workers or had no idea of the in- 
tricate workings of the system as it affected them, and so 
failed to remedy existing evils. The writer has in mind one 
of the best shops where the management is thoroughly fair 
and liberal in spirit, in which conditions existed which would 
not be tolerated for a moment by a body of workers with 
a real voice in affairs, or by the management if it knew of 
them, yet the front office here is always open. The fact 
is that where workers are individualized as in scientific 
management shops, their just complaints will not ordinarily 
be voiced even to a management in which they have confi- 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 109 

dence, much less to an autocratic employer. Anyone who 
knows anything of working-class psychology understands 
perfectly well that the individual worker does not dare to 
unburden himself to his superiors even under the best of 
circumstances. He fears to get himself marked down as a 
kicker or an agitator. The only way, then, by which the 
voice of the workers can reach the management fully and 
clearly is through group organization, and some sort of 
machinery which will allow of representation by those not 
directly involved. But such organization and machinery are 
almost wholly lacking in scientific management shops. The 
managers expect the workers to come to them with com- 
plaints, and they judge that the workers are satisfied by 
the absence of complaints. Time after time the writer was 
informed that the workers were entirely satisfied because 
no complaints had been made for months or only one a 
month or year. Manifestly, if what has been said of the 
workers' psychology is true, these are cases of complete 
self-deception. That this is the case the writer has proved 
by quizzing the men. It would seem, then, that the claim 
to democracy, based on the close association of the man- 
agement and men and the opportunities allowed for the 
voicing of complaints, is not borne out by the facts, and 
that in the general run of scientific management shops, 
barring the presence of unionism and collective bargaining, 
the unionists are justified in the charge that the workers 
have no real voice in hiring and discharging, the setting of 
the task, the determination of the wage rates or the gen- 
eral conditions of employment ; that this charge is true 
even where the employers have no special autocratic ten- 
dencies, much more so, therefore, where, as in many cases, 
they are thoroughly imbued with the autocratic spirit. With 
rare exceptions, then, democracy under scientific manage- 
ment cannot and does not exist apart from unionism and 
collective bargaining. 

What, then, is the attitude of scientific management 
toward unions and bargaining by groups ? We have already 



no SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

noted the Taylor claims that scientific management makes 
unionism and collective bargaining unnecessary as means of 
protection to the workers, but that it welcomes the co- 
operation of unionism. These claims would seem to indi- 
cate that scientific managers themselves recognize that their 
methods are naturally destructive of collective bargain- 
ing and unionism, but that they are in a tolerant mood 
toward organized labor and its policies. Whether or not 
scientific management is fundamentally inimical to collec- 
tive bargaining and trade unionism, we shall reserve for 
later consideration. Here the question is one merely of 
the facts of the case as they at present exist. The present 
investigation indicates that the Taylor claims decidedly do 
not represent the actual situation. While scientific man- 
agers, in general, do believe that scientific management 
makes collective bargaining and unionism unnecessary as 
means of protection to the workers, this statement does not 
present their attitude in its entirety. There are doubtless 
managers who go no further than this in their thought. 
Some have no conception of the real meaning of collective 
bargaining and, therefore, no positive objections to it; 
some would even like to see it instituted, if this could be 
done without interfering with the methods which they 
employ and their present operation. But there is another 
class of scientific managers — and they constitute a large 
proportion — who have had experience with collective bar- 
gaining, or who think that they know its full implications, 
who are positively and unalterably opposed to it. They 
cannot see how it can possibly be made to harmonize with 
scientific management and, if it could be, they would still 
regard it as an unwarranted interference with the natural 
prerogatives of the employers. The fact that collective 
bargaining in the union sense of the term is, in general, 
quite foreign to scientific management shops, where its 
workers are not backed by outside organizations, should be 
decisive with respect to the general attitude of the scien- 
tific management employers in this regard. 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE in 

Does the scientific manager, as a matter of fact, welcome 
the cooperation of unionism? Here, again, the facts should 
decide the contention. The fact is that, while in numbers 
of scientific management shops some unionists are employed, 
they are not generally employed as union men, and the 
union is rarely recognized and dealt with as such. At the 
outset of his investigation the attention of the writer was 
forcibly called to certain cases where unionism was toler- 
ated in scientific management shops, as proof of the tolerant 
attitude of the managers, and the entire compatibility of 
scientific management and unionism. Investigation proved 
that inferences drawn from such cases were, in general, 
altogether misleading. In the most notable instances, in- 
vestigation showed that the union was forced upon the 
employers by exceptional circumstances and that they were 
very much chafed by the situation. In other instances, the 
unions had existed, but with the result of a definite con- 
test, and the establishment of the open shop. Where union- 
ism was looked upon with complacency, it was usually 
found that the union was represented by a small group of 
men and performed none of the bargaining functions in the 
shop. In One case, particularly, where assurance had been 
given that perfect harmony existed between the manage- 
ment and the organized employees, the superintendent was 
quizzed in regard to the functions and activities of the union. 
About these things he was absolutely uninformed ; why the 
union existed or what it did, he could not tell. He had no 
dealings with it as such, and the men who belonged to it 
were treated in no way differently from the other indi- 
vidual workers in the shop. The fact is that those who 
declared the willingness of scientific management to wel- 
come the cooperation of unionism, in general, either knew 
nothing about unionism and its rules and regulations or 
were thinking of a different kind of unionism from that to 
which the American Federation of Labor stands committed, 
and a kind of cooperation foreign to its ideals and practices. 
This is indicated by Mr. Taylor's continually reiterated 



112 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

statement, echoed by the most democratic of his followers, 
that the trouble with the present day unionism is that it is 
organized for war, and that it limits the output. So long 
as it holds to these fallacies, scientific management can have 
no commerce with it. 

To sum up: The conception of democracy held by Mr. 
Taylor is, for the present, at least, a Utopian dream ; in their 
attitude toward industrial democracy as a practical mat- 
ter, scientific managers are divided; a very few are truly 
democratic in spirit and purpose; some think themselves 
democratic, but analysis of their ideas and attitude shows 
them to be in reality adherents of a benevolent despotism 
in industry; more are definitely committed to the ordinary 
autocratic attitude of employers generally. In practice, 
scientific management generally tends to weaken the com- 
petitive power of the individual worker, and thwarts the 
formation of shop groups and weakens group solidarity; 
moreover, scientific management generally is lacking in the 
arrangements and machinery necessary for the actual voic- 
ing of the workers' ideas and complaints, and for the demo- 
cratic consideration and adjustment of grievances. Col- 
lective bargaining has ordinarily no place in the determina- 
tion of matters vital to the workers, and the attitude toward 
it is usually tolerant only when it is not understood. Fi- 
nally, unionism, where it means a vigorous attempt to en- 
force the viewpoint and claims of the workers, is in gen- 
eral looked upon with abhorrence, and unions which are 
looked upon with complacency are not the kind which or- 
ganized labor, in general, wants, while the union cooperation 
which is invited is altogether different from that which 
they stand ready to give. In practice, scientific manage- 
ment must, therefore, be declared autocratic; in tendency, 
a reversion to industrial autocracy, which forces the work- 
ers to depend on the employers' conception of fairness, and 
limits the democratic safeguards of the workers. Whether 
it is fundamentally and inevitably so will be considered 
later. 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 113 

IS- Causes of the Shortcomings of Scientific Management 
in Practice 

The foregoing discussion should not prejudice the reader 
against all scientific managers or all attempts at scientific 
management. We have already called attention to the greatj 
possible benefits of the movement, and to men and shops! 
of exceptional merit. There is, too, another side of the 
matter, namely, "unfounded and unproved trade union ob- 
jections," which it has been found impossible to discuss 
within the limits of the present study. In this field, reason- 
able conformity to certain important ideals and claims can 
be shown to exist.^ It must also be considered that scien- 
tific management is still in its infancy or early trial stages, 
and that immaturity and failure to attain ideals in practice 
are necessary accompaniments to the development of any 
new industrial or social movement. Doubtless, many of its 
shortcomings will, therefore, be cured by time. 

Before this can be brought about, however, certain potent 
causes of present evil must be eradicated. The first of 
these is a persistent attempt on the part of experts and 
managers to apply scientific management and its methods 
outside their natural sphere. We speak of modern in- 
dustry as though it were all of one piece. But, in fact, 
there is no single necessary or logical line of industrial de- 
velopment; no perfectly uniform set of conditions and 
problems in different industries or even in different shops 
with the same general productive output. There can, then, 
be no single system of organization or methods equally ap- 
plicable to all industries and to all shop conditions. ^ (;!&=. 
q uate managemen t_^q appjiVd t o any ''hiJ 2_jgJ[lj2t--^^?^^^liZZ-, 
made garment to which it can be made easily to _conf orm, 
^buflnusr'be workedT^outby the slow and painful process of . ^ 
cut a nd try. _ It is not a surprising thing, then, to find that 
the most fundamental methods of scientific management as 
at present practiced, especially those which bear most di- 

* See Preface. 



114 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

rectly on labor and labor conditions, have a limited sphere 
of applicability. As indicated in the discussion of time 
study and modes of payment, they can be applied with 
reasonable accuracy and justice to the workers only where 
Iproduction is relatively stable, and only in the more simple 
land repetitive lines of work. Much of the evil of which 
Workers complain in scientific management shops is due to 
attempts to apply these methods indiscriminately and ar- 
bitrarily to all sorts of industries, under all sorts of con- 
ditions and to all kinds of work. _For this, Mr. Taylor is 
^ to be held largely responsible. His experience primarily 
was that of a machinist. He worked out a system of con- 
trol for application to the machine shop where the dangers 
of overspeeding and overfatigue are not as great as in some 
other industries and the human factor requires relatively 
less consideration in the setting of the task. But, being an 
enthusiast, he proceeded at once to broad generalizations, 
based on his machine shop experience. He believed that 
he had discovered industrial laws and methods of universal 
applicability. And being also an idealist, he failed to dis- 
tinguish between what might be and what is. His person- 
ality and his claims fired a relatively large following who, 
without much understanding of the subtler labor problems 
involved, proceeded to attempt the universal application of 
his methods, and these have been followed by a less intelli- 
gent and less worthy set of imitators. 

A second chief source of danger and evil to labor in 
the application of scientific management is that it offers its 
wares in the open market, but it has developed no means by 
which it can control the use of these by the purchaser. In 
large part, the practical departure of scientific management 
from its ideals is the result of special managerial or pro- 
prietorial aims, and impatience of delay in their fulfillment. 
While there are exceptions to the rule, it is generally true 
that the management in calling in the systematizer has its 
own very special and immediate ends and that the systema- 
tizer does not have a free hand in carrying out his plans 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 115 

and purposes, but is subject to the will, judgment and whim 
of the employing or proprietary personnel. In many cases, 
the employing management is not a unit in its desires and 
demands. The systematizer, therefore, more often than 
not, meets with opposition within the management, and 
must subordinate his design and modify his plans and meth- 
ods to meet the wishes of an opposing element there. But 
even where the management is a unit in desire, its purposes 
are often not in immediate harmony with those of the sys- 
tematizer. In many cases, the expert is called in because the 
establishment is in financial or industrial straits, and the 
chief concern of the management is quick increase of pro- 
duction and profits. It must meet its competitors here and 
now, and cannot afford to expend more than is necessary 
to do this, or to forego immediate returns while the founda- 
tions are being laid for a larger but later success, and with 
careful regard to immediate justice and the long-time wel- 
fare of its working force. In such cases, which are de- 
plorably many, the systematizer must usually forego, to 
a great extent, the careful preliminary improvement and 
standardization of machinery and processes, the adequate 
organization of the accounting and sales departments, and 
the careful development of a functional staff, things which 
the best authorities agree should precede the definite hand- 
ling of the labor problem, and proceed immediately to task 
and rate setting, with results varying greatly from his ma- 
ture designs and entailing almost inevitably unintended posi- 
tive errors and injustices where the laborers are concerned, 
and absence or immature application of the means and 
methods designed by him for their protection and welfare. 
The outcome is frequently conflict between the systematizer 
and the management, resulting in the abandonment of the 
scheme only partially worked out or the retirement of the 
expert, leaving the management to apply crudely the meth- 
ods partially installed, sometimes to the detriment of the 
workers and their interests. 

It is true that the situation thus outlined is not of uni- 



ii6 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

versal application. In some cases, the concern to be sys- 
tematized is in a strong industrial and financial condition, 
and the management is fully converted to the plan of the 
systematizer, and willing to wait for long-time results. But 
more often than not, opposition exists somewhere within 
the management group, and, in general, the extent and di- 
rection of the work of the systematizer are limited by the 
dominant proprietorial will. The writer has frequently 
given ear to bitter complaints from members of the small 
group of experts who represent the highest ideals and in- 
telligence of the movement, in regard to the managerial 
opposition which they have encountered, and frequent apol- 
ogies have been offered for the conditions and results of 
their work, accompanied by the statement that they could 
go no further than the management would allow, or that 
things had been done by the management against their 
judgment and for which they could not stand. 

But it is not always the willful opposition of the manage- 
ment or the special financial straits of the concern that 
prevent the practical realization of the best ideals of the 
expert in the process of installation. After all, scientific 
management is closely interlocked with the mechanism of 
production for profit and the law of economy rules.^ Many 
things, which would be desirable from the ideal viewpoint - 
and which are a practical necessity if the interests of the 
workers are to be fully protected, are not always or usually 
economical. This is especially true of time study, task set- 
ting and rate making. Here it frequently happens that 
relatively simple and crude tests serve to establish condi- 
tions and lay down rules that will increase production and 
profits without giving rise to glaring injustices or causing 
open labor protest, and even, it may be, with immediate 
gain to most of the workers over their previous wages and 
conditions of employment, while the more thorough tests 

* Under the competitive system, with all of its possible benefits, 
it is tmdeniable that the interests of society or of the laboring group 
may be sacrificed for individual gain. 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 117 

which would be required to secure relative justice to all 
the workers and to insure long-time benefits to them are 
uneconomical, costing more than they would return to the 
management. Under such circumstances, even the most 
thoroughgoing scientific management experts halt the work 
of installation far short of conditions which would make 
good the labor claims of scientific management, and content 
themselves with "making allowances" which "in their judg- 
ment" are sufficient to offset any evils and injustices which 
might arise out of the crudity of their tests and studies. 

The arbitrary will of the employer, then, and the law 
of economy are two potent special forces which contribute 
to the existing diversity, incompleteness and crudity of 
scientific management as it is practiced, even where the 
systematizer is possessed of the highest intelligence and 
imbued with the best motives of his group. 

But to explain the situation as it exists at present, two 
other important factors must be taken into consideration. 
The first of these is the existence and practice of self-styled 
scientific management systematizers and time study experts 
who lack in most respects the ideals and the training essen- 
tial to fit them for the work which they claim to be able 
to do. Scientific management as a movement is cursed with 
fakirs. The great rewards which a few leaders in the move- 
ment have secured for their services have brought into 
the field a crowd of industrial patent medicine men. The 
way is open to all. No standards or requirements, private 
or public, have been developed by the application of which 
the goats can be separated from the sheep. Employers have 
thus far proved credulous. Almost anyone can show the 
average manufacturing concern where it can make some 
improvements in its methods. So the scientific management 
shingles have gone up all over the country, the fakirs have 
gone into the shops, and in the name of scientific manage- 
ment have reaped temporary gains to the detriment of the 
real article, the employers and the workers. 

Just who these fake scientific management expens and 



Ii8 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

time study men are it is impossible to tell, since no recog- 
nized standards of judgment exist. Accusations indeed are 
over-plentiful, but repetition of them would not be war- 
ranted here. What proportion of the numerous failures of 
so-called scientific management, of the positive errors and 
evils of time study, task setting and rate making, found in 
shops under this name, are due to the work of these fakirs, 
is another matter on which no judgment can be passed, 
though scientific managers have variously estimated the 
fakirs as four out of five, or nine out of ten. The certainty 
is that this element exists; that its representatives, appar- 
ently, cannot be clearly distinguished and set off under ex- 
isting circumstances from the more legitimate scientific man- 
agement practitioners ; that the legitimate scientific man- 
agement group seems powerless to eliminate or control it; 
and that it exposes employers and workers to the losses 
and injustices of crude and inaccurate industrial tinkering 
— all in the name of scientific management and under the 
protection of its promises and its claims. 

Fake scientific management experts, however, are not 
alone responsible for the lack of training and intelligence 
which contribute to the diversity and immaturity of scientific 
management in practice and its failure to make good the 
labor claims of its most distinguished leaders. The fact is 
that, on the whole and barring some notable exceptions, the 
sponsors ' and adherents of scientific management — experts 
and employers alike — are profoundly ignorant of very much 
that concerns the broader humanitarian and social problems 
which it creates and involves, especially as these touch the 
character and welfare of labor. This statement is made 
wholly without intent to impugn the general intelligence or , 
motives of the rnembers of the scientific management group. 
While expressing this as his mature conviction, the writer 
wishes to pay a high tribute to the character and intellec- 
tual capacity of many of the scientific management experts 
and employers with whom he has become acquainted dur- 
ing the course of this investigation.- Many of these, meft 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 119 

have exhibited a straightforward honesty and sincerity of 
purpose that cannot be questioned; they have shown an 
earnest desire to get at the truth underlying this contro- 
versy, and to rectify all errors and evils that could be dem- 
onstrated to them in connection with their work or shops ; 
many of them are serious students of economic and social 
questions, who bring to their study earnestness and intelli- 
gence of a high order, and a sincere desire to safeguard 
and improve the welfare of labor. But, viewing the group 
as a whole, the fact remains as stated above. This is partly 
due to the newness of their approach to the questions in- 
volved, and a consequent unfamiliarity with the many facts 
and problems that have been brought into prominence re- 
cently by the students of the social sciences, and especially 
with the newer viewpoints and standards of judgment that 
have thus been developed. The prominent members of the 
scientific management group — engineers and employers for 
the most part — seem to be developing their economic and 
social theories, in fact, almost wholly on the basis of their 
own experience and of the simple, fundamental and general 
assimiptions which economists and social scientists gen- 
erally have tried out and abandoned. Their reasonings and 
conclusions in regard to such matters, therefore, have many 
of the marks of the naivete of early scientific beginnings. 
Problems which are to the modern social scientists complex 
and enormously difficult — at present unsolvable— ^-appear to 
them simple, and they rush to solutiqns, conclusions and 
claims, deduced from narrow, absoliitistic assumptions, 
which have no warrant in fact. This awakening to eco- 
nomic an^ social problems by the engineers and scientific 
min^gement employers is, in itself, a most hopeful sign. 
They are close to the practical problenis of industry. Their 
efforts seem bound in the end to correct economic errors 
and to enrich economic thoughts But, in the present, the 
tendency is to rush in boldly with crude statements of 
"laws" anc^ "solutions" and claims that could be made 
. good only on the basis of much that social science at its 



120 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

best has as yet not attained. And these solutions and 
claims are rendered the more naive and inadequate by the 
fact that these engineers and employers have not ap- 
proached, as a rule, and, by the very nature of their occupa- 
tion and experiences, cannot approach any real compre- 
hension of the peculiar conditions and relations that create 
the aims, attitudes, problems, standards, and ideals of the 
workers, whose needs and welfare and sense of justice 
they easily assume to interpret and to be able to satisfy. . 
This naive ignorance of social science and of the social 
' effects of scientific management, and the cocksureness which 
accompanies it are perhaps the most potent caiise^of the 
'.diversity and immaturity of scientific management where it 
^touches the welfare of the labor group. It is because of 
this ignorance and unwarranted assurance that there is a 
strong tendency on the part of scientific management ex- 
perts to look upon the labor end of their work as the least 
difficult and requiring the least careful consideration. To 
their minds, the delicate and difficult part of the task of in- 
stallation is the solution of the material,- mechanical and 
organic problems involved. They tend to look upon the 
labor end of their work as a simple technical matter of so 
setting tasks and making rates, that the workers will give 
the fullest productive cooperation. They tend naively to 
assume that when the productivity of the concern is in- 
creased and the laborers are induced to do their full part 
toward this end, the labor problem in connection with 
scientific management is satisfactorily solved. In short, 
in the majority of cases, the labor problem appears to be 
looked at as one aspect of the general problem of produc- 
tion in the shop, and it is trustfully assumed that, if it is 
solved with reference to this problem, it must also be solved 
with due regard to labor's well-being and its just demands. 
This seems to have been the characteristic attitude of scien- 
tific management from the beginning. Labor was looked 
upon simply as one of the factors entering into production, 
like machinery, tools, stores and other elements of equip- 



SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT IN PRACTICE 121 

ment. The problem was simply how to secure an efficient 
coordination and functioning of these elements. It was 
only after the opposition of labor had been expressed that 
scientific management began to be conscious of any other 
aspect of the labor matter. And, with some notable excep- 
tions, scientific management experts and employers still 
look upon the labor matter almost solely as an aspect of the 
general production problem, and have little positive interest 
or concern in regard to it otherwise. 

The crude and variable handling of the labor end of the 
scientific management installation and operation is a natural 
consequence. It is largely for this reason that scientific 
management experts who have had actual experience in 
only one line of industry boldly undertake the systematiza- 
tion. of shops in industries with which they are practically 
unfamiliar. The affair in their mind is simply productive 

j^ciency through the application of certain mechanical and 
organic ^principles. It is for this reason that time study 
experts who perhaps have had no first-han-d industrial ex- 
perience feel themselves capable of setting tasks for any 
shop or industry, to apply to any laborer or group of labor- 
ers. It is for this reason that the mass of the time study 
men found in the shops, who actually set tasks and make 
rates, are poorly paid and are not men of an intellectual 
and moral quality and breadth of training and education 
calculated to inspire the confidence of the investigator and 
his official experts. It is largely for this reason also that 
the methods of time study and task setting vary greatly 
from shop to shop even in the same industry; that tasks 
are often set by guess or^on an inadequate basis of study; 
that many different variations of the modes of payment 
advocated by scientific management are found, and that 
in the same shop and often in the same department, different 

^modes of task setting and different modes of payment co- 
exist; that tasks are often not set on complicated work 
and on new work; that, consequently, the most efficient 
workers sometimes must be content with the day rate while 



122 ■ SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

beside them less efficient men earn the day rate and a bonus 
in addition; that the selection of workers varies little in 
method from that employed in ordinary shops; that little 
actual attention is paid to studies of fatigue ; and that the 
ability of the worker to make the task is usually considered 
evidence of sufficient training and of adaptation of the task 
to the worker. All of which things characterize scientific 
management in practice though they may not be universal 
under it. - 

It is probable that scientific managers will object to these 
statements, pleading that these are mainly variations and 
conditions due to the time element, or to- the necessity im- 
posed by the law of costs. - They will say, for example, 
when a new and unusual job comes in that neither time, 
nor economy will allow of careful time studies; that, if 
careful studies were made of all the variations of a com- 
plicated task, the expense of such studies would wipe out 
the profit ; that, in general, they are proceeding toward the 
full realization of the ideal of scientific management as 
fast as economy will allow. But such pleas would only 
serve to confirm the main cpntention that scientific managers 
and scientific management employers generally are neces- 
sarily ruled, like all members of the employing group, by ' 
the forces of cost and profits, that to them the labor prob- 
lem is primarily an aspect of the greater problem of pro- 
duction, and that in the end the needs arid welfare of labor 
must be subordinated to these things. Beneath all other 
causes of shortcomings of scientific management, therefore, 
in its relation to labor, there seems to be the practical fact 
of an opposition of interests between the profit-taking and 
the labor groups, which makes extremely doubtful the pos- 
sibility that its shortcomings from the viewpoint of labor 
are capable of elimination. 



ULTIMATE EFFECTS UPON LABOR WELFARE 123 

C. Scientific Management and Labor Welfare 

Thus far, we have emphasized the effects on labor of 
scientific management as it is actually practiced. We come 
now to more fundamental matters — inherent characteris- 
tics of scientific management and its more ultimate effects 
upon labor and labor welfare, assuming it to be fully and 
properly applied. 

Scientific management, at its best, furthers the modern 
tendency toward the specialization of the workers. Its 
most essential features — functional foremanship, time study, 
task setting and efficiency payment — all have this inherent 
effect. Functional foremanship means that the worker 
is to have taken from him much of the former work which 
he performed in connection with the particular job. An 
example of this is afforded by the work of the machine 
operator, whose machine is not of the largely automatic 
or automatic type. Under the ordinary form of manage- 
ment found in industries, the machine operator is some- 
thing more than a mere feeder of material into the machine, 
for he performs manual and mental labor as the result of 
his craft knowledge and skill, which is as essential to com- 
plete the product as is the work done by the machine. In 
addition to being a machine operator, he cares for the 
machine, corrects and repairs minor accidents, makes neces- 
sary adjustments, attends to the belting and grinds his own 
tools. He exercises also, within reasonable limits which 
call for his initiative and dependence upon his craft knowl- 
edge-, individual judgment in the laying out and setting up 
of a job, and in determining the method and the feed and 
speed to be employed in running the material through. 
Under scientific management, on the other hand, in its 
fullest development, this same workman becomes a machine 
tender. All the extra work is done for him by a series 
of functional foremen or specialist workmen. The belting 
connected with the machine is cared for by a special func- 
tionary — the belt man ; the tools which he uses are brought 



124 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

to him already ground by a specialist who does nothing 
else; his materials are always at hand, delivered by the 
move man, who also takes away the product. The laying 
out and setting up of the work, the feed and speed to be 
used in doing it, and the mode of handling the material and 
putting it through the machine are determined by special 
functionaries and embodied in written instructions, except 
where the functional foreman is actually present to per- 
form or assist in the initial operation or where the work 
is so thoroughly subdivided and repetitive that actual in- 
structions are not deemed necessary, and, though the worker 
may depart in some instances from the instructions given, 
he does so at the peril of the bonus, premium or higher 
differential piece rate. Under the system as fully devel- 
oped, he is intended to be and is, in fact, a machine feeder 
and a machine feeder only, with the possibility of auxiliary 
operations clearly cut off and with means applied to dis- 
courage experimentation. And what applies to the machine 
feeder applies with more or less thoroughness to machine 
and hand operatives generally. Functional foremanship 
projects the managerial activity down into every phase of 
the shop work. As Mr. Taylor says, it effects a more 
equal division of the work between the management and 
the men by taking from the latter many of the activities 
which they were formerly obliged to perform. 

But it is not merely in stripping from the job its auxil- 
iary operations that scientific management tends to spe- 
cialize the work and the workman. Time study, the chief 
cornerstone of all systems of scientific management, tends 
inherently to the narrowing of the job or task itself. The 
chief function of time study is the analysis of work; the 
reduction of operations to their elementary motions and 
units, and the recombination of these elements into opera- 
tions more quickly and easily performed. Doubtless, time 
study thus may sometimes result in the discovery that new 
elements or operations may be added to former jobs with 
a distinct contribution to efficiency and economy, or that 



ULTIMATE EFFECTS UPON LABOR WELFARE 125 

former operations may be effectively combined. But as 
the final object of time study, so far as it directly touches 
the workers, is to make possible the setting of tasks so 
simple and uniform and so free from possible causes of 
interruption and variation, that definite and invariable time 
limits can be placed upon them, and that the worker may 
be unimpeded in his efficient performance of them by the 
necessity for questioning and deliberation, the preponderat- 
ing tendency of time study is to split up the work into 
smaller and simpler operations and tasks. This tendency 
is not always apparent in scientific management shops be- 
cause sometimes, especially where these represent an old- 
established machine industry, the specialization of work 
has already been carried to the extreme, compatible with 
the machinery in use. But time study furthers the inven- 
tion of new machinery of a more automatic type and of 
machinery for the performance of former hand operations. 
An interesting side light was thrown upon this whole 
matter in one shop visited where time study for stand- 
ardization and improvement had been especially empha- 
sized. Here former hand work had been progressively 
converted into machine work, and the cycle of many opera- 
tions in the particular job had become so short that the 
management had been unable to catch them accurately by 
means of the stop watch, and so despaired of being able 
to set tasks by means of elementary time study. Decidedly, 
then, time study tends to further the modern tendency 
toward specialization of the job and the task. 

With functional foremanship lopping off from the job 
auxiliary operations, and time study tending to a narrow- 
ing of the task itself, task setting and efficiency methods 
of payment come into play as forces tending to confine 
the worker to a single task or a narrow range of opera- 
tions. The worker is put upon the special task for which 
he seems best adapted, and he is stimulated by the methods 
of payment employed to make himself as proficient as 
possible at it. When he succeeds in this, to shift him to 



126 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

another task ordinarily involves an immediate and distinct 
loss to the employer, and the worker himself naturally 
resents being shifted to a new task involving, thus, an 
immediate loss in his earnings. Here worker and employer 
are at one in their immediate interest to have the job so 
simple that the operation can be quickly learned and the 
task made, and that shifting of tasks be eliminated as far 
as possible. The employer, besides, has another motive 
for this in that the shifting of the workers multiplies the 
records and renders more complex the system of wage 
accounting. It is true that the scientific management em- 
ployer, like any other, must have a certain number of 
workers in the shop who are capable of performing a plu- 
rality of tasks. This is necessary to meet the special exi- 
gencies which arise from absences of workers, special rush 
orders, the maintenance of the organization and the con- 
tinuation of operations during slack periods. But the 
tendency is to have as few all-round workers as is neces- 
sary to meet these emergencies. The methods of scientific 
management operate most effectively when they break up 
and narrow the work of the individual, and the ends of 
scientific management are best served when the rank and 
file of the workers are specialists. 

This inherent tendency to specialization is buttressed, 
broadened in its scope and perpetuated by the progressive 
gathering up and systematizing in the hands of the em- 
ployers of all the traditional craft knowledge in the pos- 
session of the workers. With this information in hand 
and functional foremanship to direct its use, scientific 
management claims to have no need of craftsmen, in the 
old sense of the term, and, therefore, no need for an ap- 
prenticeship system except for the training of functional 
foremen. It, therefore, tends to neglect apprenticeship 
except for the training of the few. And as this system- 
atized body of knowledge in the hands of the employer 
grows, it is enabled to broaden the scope of its operation, 
to attack and specialize new operations, new crafts and new 



ULTIMATE EFFECTS UPON LABOR WELFARE 127 

industries, so that the tendency is to reduce more and more 
work to simple, specialized operations and more and more 
workers to the position of narrow specialists. Nor does 
scientific management afford anything in itself to check or 
offset this specializing tendency. The instruction and train- 
ing offered is for specialist workmen. Selection and adap- 
tation are specializing in their tendencies. Promotion is for 
the relatively few. The whole system, in its conception and 
operation, is pointed toward a universally specialized indus- 
trial regime. 

But scientific management is not only inherently special- 
izing, it also tends to break down existing standards and 
uniformities set up by the workmen, and to prevent the 
establishment of stable conditions of work and pay. Time 
study means constant and endless change in the methods 
of operation. No sooner is a new and better method dis- 
covered and established and the conditions of work and 
pay adapted to it than an improvement is discovered in- 
volving perhaps new machinery, new tools and materials, 
a new way of doing things, and a consequent alteration 
of the essential conditions of work and pay, and perhaps 
a reclassification of the workers. Change and more change 
is the special purpose and mission of this special instru- 
ment and central feature of scientific management. That 
scientific management shops do reach a position of stable 
equilibrium does not militate against this contention. They 
remain relatively unchanged because of a failure to avail 
themselves fully of the possibilities which time study af- 
fords. The tendency to flux in every minutest feature and 
method of doing work and dealing with workmen is always 
there. 

Ample evidence to support this analysis was afforded 
by the investigation. Where the system was found rela- 
tively completely applied, the mass of the workers were 
engaged in specialized tasks ; there was little variation in the 
operations except in emergencies ; apprenticeship for the 
many was abandoned or was looked upon as an invest- 



128 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

ment which brought no adequate returns and was slated 
for abandonment; almost everywhere scientific manage- 
ment employers expressed a strong preference for specialist 
workmen, old crafts were being broken up and the drafts- 
men given the choice of retirement or of entering the ranks 
of specialized workmen ; in the most progressive shops, the 
time study men were preparing the way for a broader 
application of the system by the analytical study of the. 
operations and crafts not yet systematized. Changes in 
methods and classification of workers were seen even dur- 
ing the short course of the investigation. The system- 
atizers were attacking new and untried industries and 
apparently considered that none was inherently unfitted for 
their operations and conquest. 

In setting forth thus the specializing effects of scientific 
management at its best, and its tendency to break down 
established uniformities, there is no implied condemnation 
of the system. Scientific management, in these respects, is 
by no means a unique force. It is in line with the trend 
of modern industrial development. In general, the progress 
of machine industry and specialization have gone hand in 
hand. The old uniformities, also, have been forced to yield 
progressively in face of more effective methods made pos- 
sible by new machinery and processes of production. Scien- 
tific management, in its character and effects, is, in this 
aspect, merely another force emphasizing and strengthen- 
ing the modem movement. In so far as this tends to 
eliminate economic wastes, to substitute system in place 
of slipshod methods of management, to improve industrial 
processes and methods, and to increase productivity, it, or 
something like it, is in the direct line of progress and 
appears inevitable. Specialization and the breakdown of 
old uniformities are, under these conditions, merely a part 
of the price which we have to pay for the conquest of 
nature and industrial development. As such, they call not 
for condemnation, but rather for positive constructive effort 
to alleviate their temporary evil results, and to counteract 



ULTIMATE EFFECTS UPON LABOR WELFARE 129 

and eliminate their permanent unfavorable effects. Nor can 
scientific management be singled out to bear the whole 
burden. The problem is general and social. Such, there- 
,fore, must be the remedy. 

Lacking, however, broad and constructive alleviating and 
remedial measures, supplementary to scientific management, 
it is evident that laborers, especially craftsmen, stand to 
pay a heavy price for the general progress and improve- 
ment implied in the system, just as they have paid for the 
broader advance involved in the development of machine 
industry. For as things now are, let us see what this 
furtherance of specialization and this breakdown of uni- 
formities mean from the point of view of labor and labor 
welfare. Certain conclusions are inevitable. 

Scientific management, fully and properly applied, inevi- 
tably tends to the constant breakdown of the established 
crafts and craftsmanship and the constant elimination of 
skill in the sense of narrowing craft knowledge and work- 
manship, except for the lower orders of workmen. The 
writer has been in shop departments where, on the authority 
of the instructor, he could in ten minutes learn a process 
and perform it sufficiently well to earn the day wage, and 
could become a bonus worker within a period of two weeks. 
Some scientific management employers have asserted belief 
in their ability to get on a paying basis within three months 
should they lose their whole working force, except the 
managerial staff and enough others to maintain the or- 
ganization, if they had to begin all over again with green 
hands. What this means in increased competition of work- 
men with workmen can be imagined. Were the scientific 
management ideal as at present formulated fully realized, 
any man who walks the street would be a practical com- 
petitor for almost any workman's job. Such a situation 
would inevitably break down the basis of present-day 
unionism in its dominant form and render collective bar- 
gaining as now practiced impossible in any effective sense 
in regard to the matters considered by the unions most 



130 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

essential. It has been proved by experience that unskilled 
workers generally find it most difficult to maintain effective 
and continuous organization for dealing with complicated 
industrial situations. But effective collective bargaining, as 
we have it now, cannot exist without effective organization. 
Moreover, we have already seen how scientific management, 
apart from the matter of skill, tends to prevent the forma- 
tion and weakens the solidarity of groups within the shop.^ 
But beyond all this, time study strikes at the heart and 
core of the principles and conditions which make unionism 
effective in its present dominant form and collective bar- 
gaining possible with respect to certain most essential mat- 
ters. In so far as the unionists are right in their declara- 
tion that opposition of interests exists between employer 
and workmen, present day unionism and collective bargain- 
ing cannot exist apart from uniformity of conditions and 
stable classification of the workmen. When the employer 
can constantly initiate new methods and conditions and 
reclassify the work and the workmen, he can evade all 
efforts of the union to establish and maintain definite and- 
continuous standards of work and pay. But time study, 
as we have seen, is in definite opposition to uniformity and 
stable classification. It enables the employer constantly 
to lop off portions of the work from a certain class and 
thus constantly to create new classifications of workers, 
with new conditions of work and pay. Add to all this the 
advantage gained by the employers in the progressive gath- 
ering up and systematization of craft knowledge for their 
own uses, and the destruction of apprenticeship which cuts 

*A distinction must here be drawn between group solidarity, 
based upon craft relationships, and class solidarity based upon gen- 
eral industrial conditions and relationships. While machine industry 
has tended, and doubtless scientific management tends, to prevent 
the formation, and to break down the solidarity of craft groups, 
machine industry has been the strongest force in the creation of 
class consciousness, and industrial as well as class solidarity among 
the workers. We should expect scientific management to have a 
similar effect. 



ULTIMATE EFFECTS UPON LABOR WELFARE 131 

the workers off from the perpetuation among them of 
craftsmanship, and the destructive tendencies of scientific 
management, as far as present-day unionism and collective 
bargaining are concerned, seem inevitable.^ The outlook 
from the dominant union point of view cannot be better 
described than by quoting a recent editorial which appeared 
in the International Holders' Journal. 



Modern Industry and Craft Skill 

The one great asset of the wage worker has been his crafts- 
manship. We think of craftsmanship ordinarily as the ability 
to manipulate skillfully the tools and materials of a craft or 
trade. But true craftsmanship is much more than this. The 
really essential element in it is not manual skill and dexterity 
but something stored up in the mind of the worker. This some- 
thing is partly the intimate knowledge of the character and uses 
of the tools, materials and processes of the craft which tradi- 
tion and experience have given the worker. But beyond this 
and above this, it is the knowledge which enables him to un- 
derstand and overcome the constantly arising difficulties that 
grow out of variations not only in the tools and materials, but 
in the conditions under which the work must be done. 

In the past, for the most part, the skillful manipulation of 
the tools and materials of a craft and this craftsmanship of the 
brain have been bound up together in the person of the worker 
and have been his possession. And it is this unique possession 
of craft knowledge and craft skill on the part of a body of wage 

*This does not, of course, imply the destruction of all possible 
forms of unionism. As we have intimated earlier, scientific man- 
agement, as well as machine industry, while destructive of craft 
solidarity, seems favorable to the development of class solidarity 
among the workers. Though it tends, therefore, to destroy unionism 
based on crafts, and to render ineffective methods of unionism 
(like those of collective bargaining), which, as at present conceived 
and employed, depend for their success on the maintenance of 
crafts, stable classification of workmen, and uniform conditions, it 
does not imply the general destruction of labor solidarity or or- 
ganization. The destructive tendencies are on the present domi- 
nant form and methods of unionism. 



132 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

workers, that is, their possession of these things and the em- 
ployer's ignorance of them, that has enabled the workers to 
organize and force better terms from the employers. On this 
unique possession has depended more than on any other one 
factor the strength of trade unionism and the ability of unions 
to improve the conditions of their members. 

This being true, it is evident that the greatest blow that could 
be delivered against unionism and the organized workers would 
be the separation of craft knowledge from craft skill. For if 
the skilled use of tools could be secured from workmen, apart 
from the craft knowledge which only years of experience can 
build up, the production of "skilled workmen" from unskilled 
hands would be a matter, in almost any craft, of but a few 
days or weeks; any craft would be thrown open to the compe- 
tition of an almost unlimited labor supply; the craftsmen in it 
would be practically at the mercy of the employer. 

Of late, this separation of craft knowledge and craft skill 
has actually taken place in an ever-widening area and with an 
ever-increasing acceleration. Its process is shown in the two 
main forms which it has been taking. The first of these is the 
introduction of machinery and the standardization of tools, 
materials, product and process, which make production possi- 
ble on a large scale, and the specialization of the workmen. 
Each workman under such circumstances needs and can exer- 
cise only a little craft knowledge and a little craft skill. But 
he is still a craftsman, though only a narrow one and subject 
to much competition from below. The second form, more 
insidious and more dangerous than the first, but to the signifi- 
cance of which most of us have not yet become aroused, is the 
gathering up of all this scattered craft knowledge, systematiz- 
ing it and concentrating it in the hands of the employer and 
then doling it out again only in the form of minute instructions, 
giving to each worker only the knowledge needed for the me- 
chanical performance of a particular relatively minute task. 
This process, it is evident, separates skill and knowledge even in 
their narrow relationship. -When it is completed, the worker 
is no longer a craftsman in any sense, but is an animated tool 
of the management. He has no need of special craft knowledge 
or craft skill, or any power to acquire them if he had, and 
any man who walks the street is a competitor for his job. 



ULTIMATE EFFECTS UPON LABOR WELFARE 133 

There is no body of skilled workmen today safe from the 
one or the other of these forces tending to deprive them of 
their unique craft knowledge and skill. Only what may be 
termed frontier trades are dependent now on the all-round 
craftsman. These trades are likely at any time to be stand- 
ardized and systematized and to fall under the influence of this 
double process of specialization. The problem thus raised is the 
greatest one which organized labor faces. For if we do not 
wish to see the American workmen reduced to a great semi- 
skilled and perhaps little organized mass, a new mode of pro- 
tection must be found for the working conditions and standards 
of living which unions have secured, and some means must be 
discovered of giving back to the worker what he is fast losing 
in the narrowing of the skill and the theft of his craft knowl- 
edge. It is another problem which the organized workmen 
must solve for themselves and for society. 



Under these circumstances, the progressive degeneration 
of craftsmanship and the progressive degradation of skilled 
craftsmen under scientific management would seem inevi- 
table, unless some means can be found for their preserva- 
tion and development outside the shop. 

Granting the correctness of this interpretation, the more 
ultimate effects of scientific management, unsupplemented, 
should it become universal, upon wages, unemployment, 
and industrial peace, are matters of pure speculation. Dur- 
ing the period of transition, however, there can be little 
doubt of the results. The tendency will be toward a re- 
alignment of wage rates. The craftsmen, the highly trained 
workers, cannot hope to maintain their wage advantage over 
the semi-skilled and less skilled workers. There will be a 
leveling tendency. Whether this leveling will be up or 
down, it is impossible to say. At present, the writer be- 
lieves that scientific management is making the relatively 
unskilled more efficient than ever before, and that they 
are in general receiving under it greater earnings than ever 
before. It is evident, however, that the native efficiency 
of the working class must suffer from the neglect of 



134 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

apprenticeship, if no other means of industrial education 
is forthcoming. Scientific managers, themselves, have com- 
plained bitterly of the poor and lawless material from which 
they must recruit their workers, compared with the efficient 
and self-respecting craftsmen who applied for employment 
twenty years ago. Moreover, it must not be overlooked 
that the whole scheme of scientific management, espe- 
cially the gathering up and systematization of the knowl- 
edge formerly the possession of the workmen, tends enor- 
mously to add to the strength of capitalism. This fact, 
together with the greater ease of replacement, shown above, 
must make the security and continuity of employment in- 
herently more uncertain. It may not be such in fact, but, 
if not, the result will be by grace of the employer. 

If generally increased efficiency is the result of scientific 
management, unemployment would, in the end, seem to be- 
come less of a menace. But during the period of transi- 
tion, we should expect Its increase. Not only must the 
old craftsmen suffer as the result of the destruction of 
their crafts, but, until scientific management finds itself 
able to control markets, its Increased efficiency must result 
in gluts in special lines with resulting unemployment in 
particular trades and occupations. The writer was informed 
by a leading scientific management expert that one shop 
of six in a certain industry systematized by him could 
turn out all the product that the market would carry. The 
result to the workers. If the statement be true, needs no 
explanation. Scientific management would seem to offer 
i ultimately possibilities of better market control or better 
I adaptation to market conditions, but the experience of the 
past year of depression indicates that at present no such 
possibilities generally exist. 

Finally, until unionism as It predominantly exists has 
been done away with or has undergone essential modifica- 
tion, scientific management cannot be said to make for the 
avoidance of strikes and the establishment of industrial 
peace. Mr. Taylor's statement that no strike has ever 



ULTIMATE EFFECTS UPON LABOR WELFARE 135 

occurred under scientific management means simply that, 
if a strike occurs, scientific management, in Mr. Taylor's 
conception of it, does not exist. The writer has discovered 
several well-authenticated cases of strikes which have oc- 
curred in scientific management shops. He is inclined to 
believe that they are less frequent in this class of shops 
than elsewhere in similar establishments, owing largely to 
the fact that organized workmen are on the whole little 
employed. In its extension, however, it is certain thati 
scientific management is a constant menace to industrial! 
peace. So long as present-day unionism exists, and union- 
ists continue to believe, as they seem warranted in doing, 
that scientific management means the destruction of their 
organizations or their present rules and regulations, union- 
ism will doubtless continue to oppose it energetically when- 
ever and wherever opportunity affords. 

It has been said with much truth that scientific manage- 
ment is like the progressive invention of machinery in its 
effect upon workers and social conditions and welfare 
generally — that it gives a new impulse to the industrial 
revolution which characterized the latter part of the eight- 
eenth and the nineteenth centuries and strengthens its gen- 
eral effects and tendencies. A chief characteristic of this 
revolution has been the breakdown of craftsmanship, the 
destruction of crafts, and the carrying of the modern 
industrial world forward toward an era of specialized work- 
manship and generally semi-skilled or less skilled workmen. 
Scientific management seems to be another force urging us 
forward toward this era and practically adapted to function 
in an age of specialized and unskilled workmanship. Here 
we glimpse the great problem with which its spread and 
development confront modern society. No solution or 
series of solutions offered for this problem can be con- 
sidered at all adequate which does not meet the needs of 
such a situation. It is a long-time problem which requires 
a long-time solution. 

What is really needed, under the circumstances, is not 



136 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

so much repression and direct control as social supplementa- 
;tion and increased knowledge. The main demands are for 
a frank recognition of the trend of events and for some 
method of putting back into the worker's life the content 
which he is losing as the result of increased specialization 
and the abandonment of the old apprenticeship system. The 
development of such a method will, of course, take time. 
In the meanwhile, we need more thorough study and gen- 
eral publicity concerning the true character, policies, and 
methods of scientific management, its possibilities, respon- 
sibilities and limitations ; concerning the real character, in- 
telligence and spirit of those engaged in its application, the 
qualities and qualifications required by the best social stand- 
ards for the exercise of this power and responsibility, and 
the progressive education of scientific management experts 
and employers, labor and the public, to the needs and 
requirements of the situation. 



APPENDIX I 

Conclusions Resulting from the Investigation^ 

In the following ^ pages, your investigator and his official ex- 
perts have endeavored to set forth as briefly as may be, with 
due regard to the variety and shadings of the data involved, 
the facts as they have found them bearing on the relations of 
scientific management to labor, both organized and unorgan- 
ized. 

Two essential points stand forth. The first point is that sci- 
entific management, at its best and adequately applied, exem- 
plifies one of the advanced stages of the industrial revolu- 
tion which began with the invention and introduction of ma- 
chinery. Because of its youth and the necessary application 
of its principles to a competitive state of industry, it is, in many 
respects, crude, many of its devices are contradictory of its an- 
nounced principles, and it is inadequately scientific. Neverthe- 
less, it is to date the latest word in the sheer mechanics of 
production and inherently in line with the march of events. 

Our industries should adopt all methods which replace in- 
accuracy with accurate knowledge and which systematically 
operate to eliminate economic waste. Scientific management, 
at its best, has succeeded in creating an organic whole of the 
several departments of an institution, establishing a coordination 
of their functions which had previously been impossible, and,! 
in this respect, it has conferred great benefits on industry. 
The social problem created by scientific management, how- 
ever, does not lie in this field. It is in its direct and indi- 
rect effects upon labor that controversy has arisen, and it was 

^ As reported to the Commission on Industrial Relations. 
" In the report to the Commission on Industrial Relations, this 
section stood first in order. 

137 



138 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

in this field that the investigation was principally made. For 
the present, the introducers and appliers of scientific manage- 
ment have no influences to direct them, except where labor 
is thoroughly organized, other than their ideals, personal views, 
humanitarianism or sordid desire for immediate profit with 
slight regard for labor's welfare. 

The second point is that neither organized nor unorganized 
labor finds in scientific management any adequate protection to 
its standards of living, any progressive means for industrial 
education, or any opportunity for industrial democracy by which 
labor may create for itself a progressively efficient share in 
efficient management. And, therefore, as unorganized labor 
is totally unequipped to work for these human rights, it be- 
comes doubly the duty of organized labor to work unceasingly 
and unswervingly for them, and, if necessary, to combat an 
industrial development which not only does not contain condi- 
tions favorable to their growth, but, in many respects, is hos- 
tile soil. 

Your investigator and his official experts are of the opinion 
that all the data focus in these two points, each in its own 
way equally vital, equally indestructible and equally uncom- 
promising. On the one hand, the right of investigation, per- 
petual desire and experiment to find new ways of doing things, 
knowledge, science, efficiency — all these — advance in the ap- 
parent nature of our world, sometimes with a beneficent front, 
j sometimes as a Frankenstein, temporarily destructive of human 
I rights. On the other hand, these very human rights are un- 
fquenchable, for in the long run they contain the very life of 
itrue efficiency itself. 

The fact to face is that your Commission is dealing in this 
matter with two forces, neither of which may nor will be sac- 
rificed to the other. Also, conflict between them would simply 
be marking time against the inevitable. It is inherent in the 
nature of things that they both live and fructify. 

How then may they develop together? The solution must 
lie in practical experiments to which a great Federal body like 
yours is most competent to give sanction. You can lay down 
such principles of experimentation as may be applied to safe- 
guard the rights of both forces. But this is a subject for far 
broader and deeper deliberation than the pages of this report 



CONCLUSIONS FROM THE INVESTIGATION 139 

are competent to outline. Scientific management is but one 
fector in the broad industrial problem. 

{Signed) : Robert F. Hoxie, Investigator. 
Robert G. Valentine, Expert 

on Employing Management. 
John P. Frey, Labor Expert. 



APPENDIX II 

The Labor Claims of Scientific Management According to 
Mr. Frederick W. Taylor 

A. Labor Claims of Scientific Managers Touching the General 
Character and Spirit of Scientific Management 

The scientific managers claim that: 

1. Scientific management is a system devised by industrial 

engineers for the purpose of subserving the common in- 
terests of employers, workmen and society at large 
through the elimination of avoidable wastes, the general 
improvement of the processes and methods of produc- 
tion, and the just and scientific distribution of the prod- 
uct, 

2. Scientific management is based upon the fundamental as- 

sumption of harmony of interests between employers 
and workers, and seeks to establish complete and har- 
monious cooperation between them. 

3. Scientific management attempts to substitute, in the rela- 

tions between employers and workers, the government 
of fact and law for the rule of force and opinion. It 
substitutes exact knowledge for guesswork, and seeks 
to establish a code of natural laws equally binding upon 
employers and workmen. 

4. Scientific management thus seeks to substitute in the shop 

discipline, natural law in place of a code of discipline 
based upon the caprice and arbitrary power of men. No 
such democracy has ever existed in industry before. 
Every protest of every workman must be handled by 
those on the management side and the right or wrong 
of the complaint must be settled, not by the opinion either 
of the management or the workmen but by the great 
140 



LABOR CLAIMS: TAYLOR SYSTEM 141 

code of laws which has been developed and which must 
satisfy both sides. 
Scientific management, perforce, accepts the modern ten- 
dency toward specialization caused by machine produc- 
tion, but seeks to mitigate its possible evil effects upon 
the workers: 

a. By gathering up, systematizing and systematically 

transmitting to the workers all the traditional craft 
knowledge and skill which is being lost and destroyed 
under current industrial methods. 

b. By employing in the shop a corps of competent special- 

ists whose duty it is to instruct and train the workers, 
and to assist them whenever difficulties arise in con- 
nection with the work. 

c. By analyzing the operations of industry into their nat- 

ural parts and assigning to each workman a definite 
and by him accomplishable task. 

d. By bringing the workmen thus constantly into close, 

systematic, and helpful touch with the management. 

e. By requiring the workmen to learn and to perform not 

one merely but several operations or tasks. 
/. By treating each worker as an independent personality. 
g. By rewarding the men for helpful suggestions and im- 
provements in the methods of work. 
h. By opening up opportunities for the advancement and 

promotion of the workers. 
Scientific management seeks to eliminate overstimulation, 
overspeeding, and nervous and physical exhaustion of 
the workers: 

a. By substituting exact knowledge based upon a careful 

study of men and machines for guesswork in the set- 
ting of the task, and the determination of the hours 
and other conditions of work. 

b. By eliminating thus the need for the employment of 

pace makers. 

c. By transferring from the workers to the management 

responsibility for contriving the best methods of work. 

d. By removing from each worker responsibility for the 

work of others and for the instruction of beginners 
and helpers. 



142 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

e. By maintaining the best conditions for performing the 

work through furnishing the best tools and materials 
at the proper time and place. 

f. By training the workers in the most economical and 

the easiest methods of performing operations. 

g. By standardizing equipment and performance. 

h. By instituting and enforcing rational rest periods and 
modes of recreation during the working hours. 

i. By surrounding the workers with the safest and most 
sanitary shop environment. 

7. Scientific management makes possible the scientific selec- 

tion of workmen, i.e., the mutual adaptation of the task 
and the worker. 

8. Scientific management is thus a practical system of voca- 

tional guidance and training, and opens the way for all 
workmen to become ''first-class" men. 

9. Scientific management pays workers rather, than positions ; 

it remunerates each man according to his efficiency. 

ID. Scientific management eliminates systematic soldiering, and 
thus the hampering and discouraging of the strong and 
willing by the weak and unwilling. 

II. Scientific management, by these methods, seeks to secure 
more efficiency with less effort, to increase the product 
which may be shared by employers and laborers, to 
raise wages while lowering the labor cost, and to place 
both production and distribution upon a scientific and 
just basis. 



B. Labor Claims of ScientiHc Managers Concerning the Ef- 
fects of Scientific Management upon the Conditions of 
Work and the Character and Welfare of the Workers, 
Industrially and Socially. 

I. Scientific management develops and promotes a friendly 
feeling and relationship between the management and 
the men. 
a. The men are not soured, as under the old form of man- 
agement, by: 

(i) The arbitrary bullying of foremen. 



LABOR CLAIMS: TAYLOR SYSTEM 143 

(2) The injustice in the method and amount of 

remuneration. 

(3) The lack of proper tools and materials at the 

proper time and place for doing the work, 
and other delays and breakdowns over which 
they have no control. 

(4) The absence of proper instructions and guid- 

ance. 

(5) The necessity of doing work and assuming 

responsibility properly belonging to the 
management. 

b. They do not spend time in criticizing the management. 

c. They are satisfied with the conditions of work and pay. 

d. They, consequently, look upon their employers as their 

best friends. 

2. Scientific management promotes friendly feeling and ac- 

tion among the workers in the shop or group. 

a. It eliminates the irritation caused by the soldiering and 

poor work of individuals in the group. 

b. It eliminates the ill feeling caused by parasitism and 

advancement and remuneration by favoritism. 

c. It eliminates the irritation caused by rules which pre- 

vent the ambitious and efficient workers from doing 
their best and being paid accordingly. 

d. It eliminates the suspicion and ill feeling caused by 

the employment of pace makers. 

e. The men, consequently, work more cheerfully and are 

more helpful than under the old form of management. 

3. Scientific management stimulates and energizes the work- 

ers intellectually : 
a. By bringing the workers into constant, close and help- 
ful touch with the management; by its systematic 
transmission to the workers of industrial knowledge; 
by its definite instructions; by assigning to each 
worker a definite and accomplishable task; by re- 
quiring the worker to perform, • not one but several 
operations wherever possible; by rewarding the men 
for usable suggestions and improvements; by open- 
ing up opportunities for advancement or promotion; 
by instituting rational periods of rest and recreation; 



144 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

by treating each worker as an independent person- 
ality; by paying each man according to his effi- 
ciency : 

(i) Stimulates the thought and ambition of the 
workers, 

(2) Mitigates the monotony incident to modern 

machine industry. 

(3) Develops the workers' sense of personal 

achievement. 

(4) Puts interest, joy and zest into the work. 

(5) Develops and broadens the mechanical skill 

of the workers. 

(6) Stimulates the workers' inventive genius. 

(7) Promotes the workers' self-reliance, self-re- 

spect, individuality, personality and dignity. 

4. Scientific management guards the workers against over- 

speeding and exhaustion, nervously and physically: 

a. By substituting exact knowledge for guesswork in 

the setting of the task. 

b. By removing the suspicions of the employers that the 

workers are soldiering. 

c. By tending to prevent ignorant bidding and cut-throat 

competition. 

d. By eliminating pace setters and turning speeders into 

instructors. 

e. By training the men in the easiest methods of work. 

f. By careful studies of fatigue and the setting of the task 

on the basis of a large number of performances by 
men of different capacities, and with due scientific 
allowance for the human factor and legitimate delays. 

5. The so-called speeding-up of scientific management is, in 

the main, a speeding-up of machinery, requiring no extra 
exertion on the part of the workers. The speed of the 
men is determined by psychological and physical tests, 
and is always set with reference to long-time results. 
Scientific management challenges anyone to show any 
overstrained or overworked man in the scientific man- 
agement shops. 

6. Scientific management insures just treatment of individual 

workers, and lessens the rigors of shop discipline. 



LABOR CLAIMS: TAYLOR SYSTEM 145 

a. By keeping records of conduct and exact performance. 

b. By substituting the rule of law for the arbitrary de- 

cisions of foremen, employers and unions. 

c. By giving to the worker in the end equal voice with 

the employer. Both can refer only to the arbitrament 
of science and fact. 
Scientific management increases the skill, efficiency and 
productivity of the workers : 

a. By the scientific selection of workmen so that each man 

is set to the highest task for which his physical and 
intellectual capacity fits him. 

b. By providing each worker with the best means and 

methods of work. 

c. By educating, and training the workers mechanically 

as they were never trained before. 

d. By training the workers in the easiest and best methods 

of work. 

e. By providing immediate inspection and immediate re- 

wards for increased or improved output. 

f. By energizing the workers intellectually. 

g. By preventing the more efficient from being held back 

and demoralized by the inefficient. 
h. By raising thus the old age limit. 
Scientific management improves the quality of the product : 

a. By improved methods of instruction and inspection. 

b. By endeavoring to set a task that will show proper re- 

lation between quantity and quality. 

Scientific management tends to shorten the hours of 
labor. 

Scientific management improves the conditions of sani- 
tation and safety in the shop. 

Scientific management by all these means and methods : 

o. Improves the workers' health. 

b. Lengthens the workers' lives and period of earning 
capacity. 

Scientific management, through its general spirit and its 
systems of wage payment, prevents arbitrary rate cut- 
ting and the placing of any arbitrary limit upon the 
amount which any worker may earn. Under scientific 
management, the rate is never cut without an absolute 



146 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

change in the directions governing the work and the time 
demanded for doing it. 

13. Scientific management raises wages. 

a. It directly and immediately increases the wages o£ the 
workers in scientific management shops from 30^ 
to 100%. 

h. It raises the wages of the unskilled by enabling them 
to do work formerly done only by skilled men. 

c. It raises the wages of skilled workers by opening up 

opportunities for advancement and promotion. 

d. It tends to raise wages generally: 

(i) By broadening the field of industrial activity 
and increasing the efficiency of the workers. 

(2) By increasing the total output and thus the 
general demand for labor. 

14. Scientific management tends to prevent the displacement 

and degradation of skilled labor which is a natural con- 
comitant of developing machine industry: 
a. By broadening and improving the mechanical training 

and skill of the workers. 
h. By giving time for adjustment tO' changed industrial 

conditions. 
c. By opening up new fields of work and extensive oppor- 
tunities for advancement and promotion. 

15. Scientific management tends to increase the employment 

of labor in the trades where it is installed by cheapening 
and thus increasing the demand for the product. 

16. Scientific management tends to lessen the dangers of gen- 

eral unemployment: 
a. By the scientific selection and training of the workers 

so that each one may find the work for which he is 

best fitted and thus may become a first-class worker 

in it. 
h. By making possible a more accurate adjustment of 

supply to demand and so tending to eliminate crises 

and depression. 
c. By increasing production and so the demand for labor. 

17. Scientific management lessens the necessity for a shop 

reserve of workers and lessens the number of part-time 
men. 



LABOR CLAIMS: TAYLOR SYSTEM 147 

18. Scientific management increases the security and continuity 

of employment. The term of employment is longer and 
there is less shifting of employees in scientific man- 
agement shops than in ordinary shops. 

19. Scientific management thus betters the industrial condition 

of both skilled and unskilled labor. 

20. Scientific management makes collective bargaining and 

trade unionism unnecessary as means of protection to the 
workers. 

21. Scientific management, however, welcomes the coopera- 

tion of unionism. 

22 Scientific management tends to prevent strikes and indus- 
trial warfare. 

Q.'Xi. Scientific management elevates the workers morally and 
socially. The workers under scientific management live 
better and tend to become more temperate and saving. 

24. Scientific management democratizes industry; it gives a 

voice to both parties and substitutes the joint obedience 
of employers and workers to fact and law for obedience 
to personal authority. 

25. Scientific management tends to remove the causes of 

social unrest. 

C. Labor Claims of Scientific Managers Touching Certain 
Specific Features and Methods of Scientific Management 

In this connection, the scientific managers claim that: 
I. Time and motion study is the accurate, scientific method by 
which the great mass of laws governing the best and 
easiest and most productive movements of men are in- 
vestigated. These laws constitute a great code, which, 
for the first time in industry, completely controls the 
acts of the management, as well as those of the work- 
men ; and, therefore [these laws] : 
a. Are necessary to secure efficiency, and, therefore, jus- 
tice, to the workers, and improvement in the wages 
and conditions of employment. 

(i) They substitute exact knowledge for preju- 
diced opinion and force in determining all 
the conditions of work and pay. 



148 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

Thus they make possible and are necessary to: 

(a) The adaptation of the task to the intellectual and phys- 

ical capacity of the workers. 

(b) The payment of the workers in exact proportion to 

their efficiency. 

(c) The most efficient methods of performing the task. 

(d) The best conditions of work through the proper rout- 

ing of the jobs and materials. 

(e) The elimination of systematic soldiering. 

(f) The elimination of the suspicions of the employers 

that the workers are gaining an unfair advantage. 
(2)1 They substitute exact knowledge for ignorance 
in accounting and bidding. Thus they alone : 

(a) Make possible exact cost accounting. 

(b) Make possible the elimination of ignorant and cut- 

throat competition. 
(3) Time and motion study thus: 

(a) Is essential to the maximum of industrial and com- 

mercial efficiency, and, therefore, of wages. 

(b) Eliminates the chief causes of speeding-up, and the 

arbitrary alteration of the task. 

(c) Eliminates the chief causes of rate cutting. 

b. Time and motion study, with the use of the stop-watch, 
is not objected to by the workers, when its purposes are 
properly explained and understood by the workers, and 
when used openly and above-board by men whose knowl- 
edge and ability the workers respect. 
2. Task setting and the methods of payment employed by 
scientific management stimulate and energize the workers 
intellectually and are essential to maximum efficiency, 
maximum wages, and justice and fair dealing between 
employers and workers. 
a. Scientific task setting 

(i) Makes possible the mutual adaptation of the 

man and the work, 
(2) Promotes the training of the worker, and 

*In connection with this section, Mr. H. K. Hathaway says: 
(a) Make possible accurate cost prediction, (b) The elimination 
of ignorant competition. 



LABOR CLAIMS: TAYLOR SYSTEM 149 

makes it possible for every man to become 
"first-class" in some employment. 

(3) Puts zest into the work and gives a sense of 

achievement. 

(4) Eliminates the use of pace makers. 

(5) Promotes the workers' self-reliance and indi- 

viduality. 
b. The modes of payment employed by scientific man- 
agement : 

(i) Insure pay according to efficiency, and thus 

(a) Tend to eliminate soldiering. 

(b) Eliminate the need for pace setters. 

(c) Turn foremen into instructors. 

(d) Increase efficiency and output. 

(2) Increase wages. 

(3) Tend to guarantee against rate cutting. 

(4) Secure justice for each worker. 

(5) Promote friendly relations between the em- 

ployers and workers; prevent suspicion and 
complaints. 

(6) Promote friendly relations among the workers. 

(7) Develop the individuality of the workers. 



APPENDIX III 

The Labor Claims of Scientific Management According 
TO Mr. H. L. Gantt 

The scientific management labor claims of Mr. H. L. Gantt 
are practically identical with those of Mr. Taylor, presented 
in Appendix II, except for the following omissions and sub- 
stitutions. 

(Marginal figures refer to the correspondingly numbered 
paragraphs of the Taylor labor claims). 

A. 4. Omit the statement: "No such democracy has 

ever existed in industry before. Every protest 
of every workman must be handled by those on 
the management side, and the right or wrong 
of the complaint must be settled, not by the 
opinion either of the management or the work- 
men, but by the great code of laws which has 
been developed, and which must satisfy both 
sides." 

B. 12. Omit: "Under scientific management, the rate is 

never cut without an absolute change in the 
directions governing the work and the time de- 
manded for doing it." 

C. I. Omit : "Time and motion study is the accurate sci- 

entific method by which the great mass of laws, 
governing the best and easiest and most produc- 
tive movements of men, are investigated. These 
laws constitute a great code, which, for the first 
time in industry, completely controls the acts of 
the management as well as those of the work- 
men, and, therefore [these laws] : 
a. Are necessary to secure efficiency, and, therefore, 
justice to the workers, and improvement in the 
wages and conditions of employment." 

ISO 



LABOR CLAIMS: GANTT SYSTEM 151 

C. I. And substitute : "Time and motion study : 

a. Is necessary to secure efficiency, and, therefore, 
justice to the workers and improvement in the 
wages and conditions of employment." 
C.I. a. (2) (a) Substitute: "They make possible exact cost 
estimating" for "They make possible exact cost 
accounting." 
In addition to the above, Mr. Gantt regards A. 10 as "true, 
but not particularly important." 



APPENDIX IV 

The Labor Claims of Scientific Management According to 

Mr. Harrington Emerson 

In the following presentation of the Emerson labor claims, 
the general order and the main headings of the Taylor state- 
ment have been retained to facilitate the process of comparison. 

(Marginal figures refer to the correspondingly nimibered 
paragraphs of the Taylor labor claims.) 

A. Labor Claims of Scientific Managers Touching the 
General Character and Spirit of Scientific Management 

I. The General Definition of Scientific Management. — Mr. 
Emerson states that he does not "care for" the definition of 
scientific management authenticated by Mr. Taylor. He offers 
no positive suggestions for the revision of this definition. In 
a statement to the United States Commission on Industrial 
Relations, however, he says: "As I understand scientific man- 
agement . . . it is the subjection of materials, equipment and 
personnel, including all managers, to the highest economic laws 
in order that the universe through human ability may give 
more of its inexhaustible riches to humanity." ^ 

A study of Mr. Emerson's writings leads to the assumption 
that the following would be a characteristic statement: Sci- 
entific management is an attempt to secure economic efficiency 
through the application to industrial and commercial practice 
of ideals, common sense, competent counsel, discipline, the fair 
deal, efficiency reward, records — reliable, immediate and ade- 
quate — planning and despatching, standards and schedules, 

^Efficiency and Modern Civilization, before the United States 
Commission on Industrial Relations, Washington, D, C, April 14, 
1914 (Sect. 252). 

152 



LABOR CLAIMS: EMERSON SYSTEM 153 

standardized operations and written standard-practice instruc- 
tions. 

5. The Alleged Laws of Scientific Management and the 
Control which these Laws are Assumed to Exercise over Em- 
ployers and Workers. — Although Mr. Emerson makes the idea 
of economic law central in his definition of scientific manage- 
ment, he does not like Mr. Taylor's claim that scientific man- 
agement has succeeded in developing a code of natural laws 
which "completely controls the acts of the management as well 
as those of the workmen." On the contrary, he recognizes that 
no system can be devised which cannot be beaten by the un- 
fair employer. Scientific management, he admits, "is a tool, 
an instrument that can be just as easily applied by outsiders for 
bad as for good purpose." ^ "There are indeed employers who 
are constantly scheming to put something over on the worker, 
on their partners, on investors, on the public. . . . Scientific 
as a rolling pin in the clench of an exasperated woman, or as 
management, in the hands of such men, may be as dangerous 
a torch in a maniac's hand in a powder magazine, or as a strong 
ship with a pirate crew. Mathematics may be used to defraud 
a man as well as to add up pay rolls correctly." ^ 

4. Scientific Management and Shop Discipline. — Mr. Tay- 
lor emphasizes the idea that discipline in the scientific manage- 
ment shops is the reflex of natural law rather than the appli- 
cation of the arbitrary power of men. He says that scientific 
management "seeks to substitute in the shop discipline nat- 
ural law in place of a code of discipline based upon the caprice 
and arbitrary power of men." "Every protest of every worker 
must be handled by those on the management side and the right 
or wrong of the complaint must be settled, not by the opinion 
of either the management or the men, but by the great code 
of laws which has been developed." 

Mr. Emerson makes no positive objections to these state- 
ments but appears to rely more upon personality and persua- 
sion than upon natural law for disciplinary results. In the 
matter of discipline he wants each man "to make the other re- 

^ Interview with writer, Nov. 18, 1914. 

" Efficiency and Modern Civilisation, before the United States 
Commission on Industrial Relations, Washington, D. C, April, 1914 
(Sect. 286, 288, 289). 



154 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

sponsible." ^ "The spirit which is wanted in the shop results 
from a sense of mutual dependence and help." ^ He says 
that "he personally objects to the method of force though he 
may have to put on force once in a while." ^ "However, in 
America, you cannot say to a man : 'I will make you.' " "You 
cannot get the best out of a man and not give him 
oats." 1 

4. The Alleged Democratic Character of Scientific Man~ 
agement. — Mr. Emerson does not appear to be altogether in 
harmony with Mr. Taylor's statement respecting scientific man- 
agement that "no such democracy has ever existed in industry 
before. It gives to the worker in the end equal voice with 
the employer; both can refer only to the arbitrament of science 
and fact." Mr. Emerson recognizes that scientific management 
may or not be democratic. "There are four ways," he says, 
"of getting what you want : ( i ) By finding or discovering it ; 
(2) By persuasion; (3) By purchase; and (4) By force." ^ 
"Scientific management may be employed as an instrument for 
any of these methods." ^ His own method, he asserts, how- 
ever, "is that of discovery, persuasion, and purchase." ^ He 
personally "objects to force." ^ "He would be willing to 
leave the matter of changing rates to keep them fair to a com- 
mittee of the workmen," but "he would want to exercise the 
right of veto." ^ "The government necessarily rests with the 
management." ^ 

5. Scientific Management and the Modern Tendency To- 
ward Specialization. — Mr. Emerson does not "care for" the 
Taylor statements under this heading : ^ 

5. g. Rewards to workers for usable suggestions. 

Mr. Emerson expresses himself as "constitutionally opposed 
to offering the men rewards for suggestions" . . . "he does 
reward the workers but he makes no promises." ^ His reason 
is not a desire "to take from the men what belongs to them, 
but such a promise violates the spirit of the plant," ^ and, fur- 
thermore, cannot be redeemed. He wants "every one to work 
in the spirit of helpfulness, not in the spirit of bargaining" ; ^ 
he wants the "spirit of cooperation," "the spirit of the hive." 
"Any method that causes the men to keep back what is for the 
good of the plant as a whole is a bad one." ^ 

^Interview, Nov. 18, 1914. 



LABOR CLAIMS: EMERSON SYSTEM 155 

Beyond this there is, according to Emerson, a very practical 
reason for withholding the promise of rewards for suggestions 
made, viz., that "adequate rewards are impossible." "The 
great asset of a plant is the unrewarded and unpaid knowledge 
of the workers and it would bankrupt a plant to pay for all 
this." 1 

6. The Alleged Elimination of Over-stimulation and Speed- 
ing Under Scientific Management. — Mr. Emerson objects to 
the inference that scientific management eliminates the stimula- 
tion and speeding-up of the workers. The statement found 
in the Taylor labor claims is "too soft." He admits that sci- 
entific management "is a speeding-up system," ^ and asserts that 
"for one man who is overstimulated and consequently ex- 
hausted, a thousand rust out under any management." ^ "There 
is a rational time and speed for every movement and most 
people are too slow." "The great thing is to stimulate them all 
you can, and then you don't get the best." "The endeavor of 
scientific management is to speed every one up to the maximum 
point which he can maintain continuously with benefit to him- 
self and the operation in which he is engaged." "The whole 
advance of centuries depends upon using the human energies 
to make use of accumulated resources." ^ "We do not want 
laggards. Most of us are too flabby. We need a punch." "I 
have not the slightest sympathy with the wail about speeding- 
up." 

In mitigation of these somewhat harsh statements, Mr. 
Emerson says, however, that "the employer has no right to 
ask a man to do more than a fair amount." ^ "The worker is 
stimulated because of the reciprocal exchange of experience and 
knowledge." "The effort," he says, "is to put men into work 
in which they can take joy. It is hard to exhaust them if this 
is done." ^ 

6. b. The Alleged Elimination of the Need for Pacemakers 
under Scientific Management. — Mr. Emerson objects to the 
statement on this head authorized by Mr. Taylor to the effect 
that scientific management eliminates the need for pacemakers. 
He "wants always a pacemaker." ^ The reason is that he 

''Interview, Nov. 18, 1914. 

'' Interview, Nov. 18, 1914, and formal statement submitted to 
investigator. 



156 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

"places the standard at 50% of the fastest," and "wants the 
pacemaker to check up with." ^ 

6. c. The Transference under Scientific Management of Tra- 
ditional Craft Knowledge from the Management to the Men. — 
Mr. Emerson repudiates the word "transfer" as used in this 
connection. "The exchange of knowledge under scientific 
management," he says, is "reciprocal." ^ He does not like the 
attitude of superiority on the part of the management. He 
"gives instructions to the engineer when to start and when 
to get there, but he does not give a . . . how he gets there"; 
he "wants the men to tell him." ^ 

6. d. The Alleged Removal from the Workers under Scien- 
tific Management of Responsibility for the Work of Others and 
for the Instruction of Beginners and Helpers. — Mr. Emerson 
does not agree with Mr. Taylor at this point. He "wants each 
man to make the other responsible" ^ though, "of course, he does 
not want a man to be responsible for conditions which he can- 
not control." ^ 

7. Scientific Management and Scientific Selection and Adap- 
tation of the Workmen. — Mr. Taylor states that scientific man- 
agement makes possible the scientific selection of workmen, i.e., 
the mutual adaptation of the task and the worker. Mr. Emer- 
son says that he "does not see this in the slightest degree." ^ 
However, he states that he would "endeavor to so place each 
man that the work would give him pleasure and be fitted for 
him physically, mentally, and morally and permanently so." ^ 
Moreover, Mr. Emerson has a somewhat elaborate theory of 
selection and strong feeling in regard to the necessity and jus- 
tification for careful elimination of the unfit workers. He 
would "erect certain screens between the workers and em- 
ployment in the shop." ^ These screens are "health, intelli- 
gence, honesty (reliability), industry, temperament, aptitude, 
experience." ^ "With the proper use of these screens, it is 
almost impossible for a man who is unfitted to get into the 
shop." 1 Further, Mr. Emerson claims to apply the same rules 
to the selection of men that he does to the selection of materials : 
"designs, specifications, testing, tenders (bids) ; custody (stor- 
ing and care), operation and inspection." ^ He expresses him- 
self, moreover, very strongly in regard to the desirability and 

^Interview, Nov. 18, 1914. ^ 



LABOR CLAIMS: EMERSON SYSTEM 157 

justification for careful selection of workers so as to rule out 
the relatively incompetent. "I do not want them," he says, "I 
want to give them a jolt." ^ "If I had work for only 100 men, 
why should I not have the best 100?" ^ "Scientific management 
here is only the special application of universal truth." ^ "The 
human race has no license from the Almighty to suppress the 
law of the survival of the fittest." ^ Therefore, if he were 
running a plant, Mr. Emerson "would be very careful whom 
he let in as a worker." ^ He "does not propose to let in the 
incompetents." ^ "It is the business of those in the shop to shut 
them out." ^ "If they are unhealthy, they belong in the hos- 
pitals; if they are vicious, they belong in jails; if they are 
lazy, they belong in the bread line; if they are indigent, they 
belong in the poorhouse." ^ "A small body of highly efficient 
men is better than a large body of inefficients." ^ Practically, 
where incompetents are eliminated, "it is sometimes a matter 
of securing salvage, where otherwise the business would be a 
total wreck." ^ 

Mr. Emerson makes much use of character analyses and has 
availed himself of the methods of Dr. Katharine Blackford. 
"I have found," he states, "that having a character analysis 
before me warns me in regard to some quality which I should 
not discover immediately and so I am saved from errors and 
difficulties in dealing with men." ^ "Whether we think that 
Mrs. Blackford's system is good or not, the fact is that at . , . 
she never allowed a labor agitator to get past her into the 
shop." 1 

However, Mr. Emerson says that "he rarely, if ever, calls 
upon the management to discharge men. The result desired 
can be secured by hiring men of better grade as those of poorer 
grade drop out." ^ But he admits that "a high degree ox selec- 
tion results from the application of his system." ^ "The ineffi- 
cients are eliminated." ^ 

8. Scientific Management in Relation to Vocational Selec- 
tion, Guidance and Training. — Mr. Emerson deprecates the 
statement of Mr. Taylor that scientific management is a system 
of vocational selection. "The selection of employees," he as- 
serts, "is not and has not been a branch of shop management." ^ 
"The whole vocational business comes before scientific manage- 

* Interview, Nov. 18, 1914. 



158 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

ment." ^ He "selects his men as he does his materials." ^ "Of 
course," he admits, "we are all engaged in sizing up men as 
we are talking to them, but we are not able to size them up 
except in regard to superficial characteristics." ^ 

10. Scientific Management and the Elimination of Soldier- 
ing. — Mr. Emerson does not deny the truth of the Taylor state- 
ment that scientific management eliminates systematic soldier- 
ing and the systematic hampering of the strong and willing 
by the weak and unwilling but declares that this "is relatively 
unimportant," ^ 

11. The General Aims of Scientific Management. — In place 
of Mr. Taylor's statement that scientific management seeks 
to secure more efficiency with less effort, to increase the product 
which may be shared by employers and laborers, to raise wages 
while lowering labor cost, and to place both production and 
distribution upon a scientific and just basis, Mr. Emerson would 
substitute the following: "The ideal of a good manager is to 
give to the public more service for less pay; the public will 
respond by taking more of his product; he gives the worker 
higher pay per hour; the workers respond by giving greater 
effort and lowering unit cost. He gives the investor greater 
security and wider opportunity, not the highest returns; the 
investor responds by lowering the rate of interest; after he 
has done these things, the surplus is the special reward of 
special skill in management." ^ 

Mr. Emerson criticizes the Taylor assemblage of scientific 
management labor claims made tmder this main head- 
ing on the ground that "in general, there are many other 
things just as important as those here stated." What these 
other things are, specially indicative of the character and spirit 
of scientific management, he does not say but, on the whole, 
we may infer that he regards the whole Taylor system of claims 
as too positive and rigid. In a supplementary statement sub- 
mitted, he says: "In my limited work, I attempt to create 
an organization founded on basic principles (to handle ma- 
terials, men and equipment). I make no rules, I create noth- 
ing. I merely attempt to live in accordance with the rules that 
I find already operating in the universe. . . . Little differences 
do not disturb me." ^ 

* Interview, Nov. i8, 1914. 



LABOR CLAIMS: EMERSON SYSTEM 159 



B. Labor Claims of Scientific Managers Concerning the 
Effects of Scientific Management upon the Conditions 
OF Work and the Character and Welfare of the 
Workers, Industrially and Socially 

1. The Feeling and Relationship between the Management and 
Men under Scientific Management. — In modification of the Tay- 
lor statements that "the men do not spend time in criticism of 
the management" and that "they are satisfied with the con- 
ditions of work and pay," Mr. Emerson admits that "no one 
is ever satisfied; no one ever holds his tongue." He prefers 
to say in this connection that scientific management "lessens 
the just criticism of the management" and that "the men 
are more satisfied with the conditions of work." ^ 

2. The Feeling and Action under Scientific Management 
among the Workers in the Group or Shop. — Under this heading, 
Mr. Emerson objects first to the use of the word "eliminate" in 
the Taylor claims. Where Mr. Taylor asserts that scientific man- 
agement "eliminates the irritation caused by the soldiering 
and poor work of individuals in the group"; "eliminates the 
ill feeling caused by parasitism and advancement and remunera- 
tion by favoritism"; "eliminates the irritation caused by rules 
which prevent the ambitious and efficient workers from 
doing their best and being paid accordingly," Mr. Emerson 
would say that scientific management "lessens" all these 
things.^ 

Secondly, in this connection, Mr. Emerson refuses altogether 
to subscribe to the Taylor statement that scientific manage- 
ment "eliminates the suspicion and ill feeling caused by the 
employment of pacemakers." Mr. Emerson believes in the 
employment of pacemakers and does not admit that under his 
system they are a cause of suspicion and ill feeling.^ 

5. The Effect of Scientific Management upon the Workers 
Intellectually. — Here Mr. Emerson agrees in general with the 
Taylor statement, but he would substitute for the phrase, "by 
its systematic transmission to the workers of industrial knowl- 
edge," the statement, "by its reciprocal exchange of experience 
and knowledge," ^ and he would eliminate the phrase, "by 

^Interview, Nov. 18, 1914. 



i6o SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

rewarding the men for usable suggestions and improvements." ^ 

4. The Relation of Scientific Management to Overspeeding 
and Exhaustion, Nervously and Physically. — Mr. Emerson 
agrees in general with Mr. Taylor that scientific management 
"guards the workers against overspeeding and exhaustion." He 
rests this agreement, however, not upon the elimination of 
speeding under scientific management, but upon the general spirit 
under it and the proper placing of the workers. "The worker is 
stimulated because of the reciprocal exchange of knowledge," ^ 
"The effort is to put men into work in which they can take 
joy." ^ "When a man is properly placed he goes with joy to 
his work ; he likes it." ^ "It is hard to exhaust them if this 
is done." ^ 

Under this general heading, Mr. Emerson would substitute 
the word, "work," for "task" and would modify the phrase, "by 
substituting exact knowledge for guesswork in the setting of the 
task," to read "in the placing of the men." ^ 

7. The Effect of Scientific Management upon the Skill, Effi- 
ciency and Productivity of the Workers. — Here Mr. Emerson 
would modify the Taylor statement, "by the scientific selec- 
tion of workmen so that each man is set to the highest task 
for which his physical and intellectual capacity fits him," to 
read "by the scientific selection of workmen so that each man 
is appointed to a position in which the work will give him 
pleasure, and for which he is physically, mentally, morally and 
temperamentally fitted." ^ He would substitute "by setting up 
standards of quantity and quality" ^ for the phrase, "by provid- 
ing each worker with the best means and methods of work." ^ 
And in the phrase, "by educating and training the workers me- 
chanically as they were never trained before," ^ he would sub- 
stitute "industrially" for "mechanically." ^ 

p. Scientific Management and the Hours of Labor. — ^Mr. Em- 
erson objects to the Taylor claim that scientific management 
tends to shorten the hours of labor. Hours should be short- 
ened "for ethical reasons, not industrial reasons." ^ "If we 
try to shorten hours for industrial reasons we lose the strongest 
hold."* "Sixteen hours a day means more production than 

* Interview, Nov. 18, 1914. 

"Interview, Nov. 18, 1914, and formal statement submitted to 
investigator. 



LABOR CLAIMS: EMERSON SYSTEM i6i 

eight." 2 "I believe," he says, "in the shorter working day not 
because more output is turned out in the shorter day, but be- 
cause we want men, not machines, in the country." ^ However, 
Mr. Emerson thinks that too much is made of shortening the 
hours. "When there is joy in the work, the men ought to be 
able to work long periods." ^ "Under these circumstances, the 
shortening of the hours is a moral question." ^ In general, 
Mr. Emerson states that he does not care how long the men 
work. This statement does not mean that the working time 
is a matter of indifference to him, but he does not consider time 
as important as some other matters. "Ten minutes a day might 
be too much and 14 hours might be too little." "The employer 
has no right to ask a man to do more than a fair amount." ^ 
"If a man wishes to get this done by noon the employer has no 
right to ask him to work longer." ^ 

12. Scientific Management and Rate Cutting. — The general 
declaration of the Taylor group is that wage rates once estab- 
lished are never cut. Mr. Taylor, himself, somewhat modifies 
this declaration. He says, "scientific management, through its 
general spirit and its systems of wage payment, prevents ar- 
bitrary rate cutting, and the placing of any arbitrary limit upon 
the amount which any worker may earn. Under scientific man- 
agement, the rate is never cut without an absolute change in 
the directions governing the work, and the time demanded 
for doing it." Mr. Emerson lays much less stress upon this 
matter and makes no denial that under scientific management 
the rates may be altered after being once fixed, "in the interest 
of fairness." ^ "The essential thing in the relations between 
the men and the employers," he states, "is that the rate and 
the task should be fair; therefore, these should always be sub- 
ject to change for the purpose of keeping them fair." ^ He is 
trying, he claims, "to give the men an incentive to work, and 
advises any man, if the rate is cut arbitrarily, to drop his effi- 
ciency." ^ "He is not alarmed over the possibility of cutting 
wages, for he is trying to raise wages all the time." ^ "What 
he does not want is for the efficiency to drop." ^ "The danger, 
under the Emerson system, is that the rate will be raised too 

^ Interview, Nov. 18, 1914. 

^ Interview, Nov. 18, 1914, and statement submitted to investi- 
gator. 



i62 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

rapidly. The real matter is not rate cutting. Too much is made 
of this." 1 

But, says Mr. Emerson, "if a man wants to cut the rates, 
he will do- it, scientific management or no scientific manage- 
ment. That is a moral question. Scientific management has 
nothing to do with this question." ^ 

j^. Scientific Management in Relation to the Earnings of the 
Workers. — Mr. Emerson agrees with Mr. Taylor, generally, as 
to the effect of scientific management upon earnings, but would 
modify the Taylor statement that scientific management "di- 
rectly and immediately increases the wages of the worker in 
scientific management shops from 30 to ioo%" to read, "all 
the way from a fraction to a goodly amount, varying from a 
slight increase to a 200% wage." ^ 

Emerson calls attention to a vital difference between his 
system and those of Taylor and Gantt. Gantt requires that a 
man hit the bull's eye, or he gets no efficiency reward. Emer- 
son gives a reward for hitting the target anywhere within the 
outer circle. A man under the Emerson system receives a pre- 
mium for anything above 6y^o efficiency. The increase in 
wages under this system varies, therefore, from a small fraction 
to 200%. "The constant endeavor is to raise the efficiency of 
the shop as a whole and so the wages of all the men ; to induce 
each individual to go up in the scale of efficiency and so to in- 
crease his own wages." ^ As to the reason for higher earnings 
and their limits under scientific management, Mr. Emerson 
says, "conditions surrounding the worker must be ameliorated 
and the worker will receive more per hour, not from any phil- 
anthropy but because there is no other way of lowering unit 
costs. The improvement in conditions and the increase of re- 
turns depend on lowering the unit cost. When unit costs can 
be no longer lowered in any direction, further improvement in 
conditions and pay will cease. The lowered unit cost not 
only provides the greater margin for the worker but widens the 
market and gives employment." ^ 



Mr. Taylor makes no general statement of his wage theory 
in connection with his labor claims of scientific management. 

^Interview, Nov. 18, 1914. 

" Statement submitted to investigator. 



LABOR CLAIMS: EMERSON SYSTEM 163 

He claims merely that scientific management remunerates each 
man according to his efficiency and seeks to raise wages while 
lowering labor cost, and to place both production and distribu- 
tion upon a scientific and just basis. Elsewhere, indeed, he has 
indicated a belief in the justice of relative wage rates estab- 
lished by the unhampered operation of supply and demand. 

Mr. Emerson approaches more nearly to a definite statement 
of a wage theory. "There are three points to be considered 
in wages. A man is entitled to the current day wage. This 
is the first thing to be settled. Second, determine the equiva- 
lent for this pay. This is the other half of the wage bar- 
gain. Third, individual superiority is the privilege of the 
worker, and should be rewarded accordingly. The method of 
paying wages by the day is outgrown and antiquated. Piece 
rates are to be deprecated. The men should be given day 
wages, but an increment or premium above this may be given 
for any number of reasons. An increment for special per- 
formance is only one of many cases." 

"In this, scientific management and unionism are in accord, 
as illustrated by the union demand for an increment in pay- 
ment for overtime." ^ 

Mr. Emerson recommends, in practice, "subdividing the ques- 
tion into four parts : 

1. The standard rate per hour (preferably for a definite 
number of hours per year). 

2. A definitely specified standard equivalent in work for 
the wages paid: a fair hour's wage for a fair hour's work. 

3. Classification according to value : $.20 ; $.30 ; $.40 or 
other higher and intermediate rates with promotion from one 
rate to another for many reasons, continued service being one 
of them. 

4. A variable amount paid to the worker for his own special 
merit or performance in attaining a surpassing standard." ^ 

"Service reward," he declares, "can mathematically and with 
almost God-like justice be apportioned to the four classes, 
worker, saver, society and leader." ^ 

14. Scientific Management and the Displacement of Labor. — 

^Interview, Nov. 18, 1914. 

'^ EMciency and Modern Ciznlisation, section 338. 

"Ibid., sect. 84. 



i64 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

Mr. Emerson admits that scientific management in common 
with other industrial improvements results in the displacement 
of labor. Moreover, "any sudden change of any kind that 
causes the laying off of many men is a great evil." "Such 
lay-offs are disasters of great magnitude to the workers, to 
society, to capital." However, "the application of scientific 
management is so excessively slow" that it causes relatively 
little displacement and such disasters it is scientific manage- 
ment's highest aim to eliminate. On the other hand, "the 
worker, per se, has no merit whatever. Temporarily, of course, 
there is obligation to meet emergencies but not to perpetuate 
hand grinding and hand weaving and hand spading and hand 
writing in order to furnish work to hand spinners and weavers, 
hand diggers and copyists. I do not regard the right tO' a job 
as 'inherent.' " "The state, however, does have obligations 
and very great ones towards this problem." ^ 

15. Effect of Scientific Management upon the Employment 
of Labor in the Trades where it is Installed. — Mr. Emerson does 
not "stand for" the Taylor statement that scientific manage- 
ment "increases the employment of labor in the trades where 
it is installed by cheapening and thus increasing the demand 
for the product." "The moment," he says, "you begin to em- 
ploy scientific management the thing gets away from you." 
"In . 7 7 one shop systematized can make all the . . . 
needed in America." "It is but one of six or seven shops." 
"We are over-equipped in America." "Of course, if we could 
extend scientific management to bring in the government, the 
case might be different." ^ 

20. Scientific Management, Collective Bargaining and Trade 
Unionism. — Mr. Taylor's general position was that scientific 
management reduces most matters with which it concerns itself 
to objective scientific fact. Where this is true, bargaining and 
collective bargaining are impossible. You can no more bar- 
gain about the facts established by scientific management, he 
declared, than you can about the rising and the setting of the 
sun. Moreover, scientific management has established a great 
code of laws which completely controls the acts of the man- 

^ Efficiency and Modern Civilisation, sect. 280, 281, 278, 275, and 
statement to investigator. 
^ Interview, Nov. 18, 1914. 



LABOR CLAIMS: EMERSON SYSTEM 165 

agement and the workmen. On this account, and also because 
of its general spirit, scientific management makes collective 
bargaining and trade unionism unnecessary as protection to 
the workers. 

Mr. Emerson seems here to be in broad general agreement 
with Mr. Taylor but is somewhat more conservative in his 
claims. He says that as to payment, scientific management 
makes collective bargaining unnecessary as a protection to 
the workers, but he makes no direct claim in regard to the de- 
termination through scientific management of exact scientific 
knowledge or to the establishment of a code of natural laws 
equally binding upon employers and workers. In fact, he re- 
pudiates the idea that there is anything about scientific man- 
agement that can prevent an employer so minded from dealing 
unjustly with the workers and, therefore, does not make the di- 
rect statement that scientific management makes trade unionism 
unnecessary as a protection to the workers. He admits, how- 
ever, that there cannot be any collective bargaining in scientific 
management, basing the statement upon the broad general 
ground that "collective bargaining as to scientific facts is impos- 
sible.^ It is a question of the laws of the universe. For exam- 
ple, in the rolling of glass, it has been found by tests that the 
glass cools 500 degrees, after being taken from the furnace, in 
a short space of time that cannot be recorded by the stop-watch. 
After that time, it cools much less rapidly. The glass must be 
worked at the precise moment when it is at a proper heat. I 
cannot bargain about such matters." ^ 

However, it is to be noted that Mr. Emerson has not always 
been consistent in regard to this matter. Testifying before the 
U.S.C.I.R., when asked the question, "Is there anything in the 
system which you advocate that is not in any wise reconcilable 
with a full practice of collective bargaining from your stand- 
point?" Mr. Emerson replied: "No; I know of nothing that 
would make it antagonistic to collective bargaining." ^ 

2^. Scientific Management and the Causes of Social Unrest. 
— Mr. Emerson does not subscribe to the Taylor statement that 
scientific management tends to remove the causes of social 

* Interview, Nov. 18, 1914. 

^Testimony, United States Commission on Industrial Relations, 
p. 1447- 



i66 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

unrest. In this connection, he says, "scientific management is 
a mere tool. It does not touch the fundamental question at 
all." 1 

C. Labor Claims of Scientific Managers Touching Cer- 
tain Specific Features and Methods of Scientific Man- 
agement 

I. The General Character and Effect of Time and Mo- 
tion Study. — Mr. Emerson subscribes to the general statement 
that time and motion study is necessary to secure justice to 
the workers and improvement in the wages and conditions of 
employment. He has not claimed with Mr. Taylor, however, 
"that time and motion study is the accurate scientific 
method by which the great mass of laws governing the best 
and easiest and most productive movements of men are investi- 
gated," or that "these laws constitute a great code, which, for 
the first time in industry, completely controls the acts of the 
management as well as those of the workmen." ^ 

I. a. (i) (a.) The Adaptation of the Task to the Worker 
through Time and Motion Study. — Mr. Emerson agrees, in gen- 
eral, with the statement that time and motion study makes pos- 
sible and is necessary to the adaptation of the task to the 
intellectual and physical capacity of the worker. He would, 
however, substitute here the word, "work," for "task." ^ 

I. a. (i) (e). The Elimination of Soldiering through Time 
and Motion Study. — Mr. Emerson characterizes as unimportant 
the Taylor statement that time and motion study makes possible 
and is necessary to the elimination of systematic soldiering.^ 

I. a. (3) (b). Time and Motion Study in Relation to Speed- 
ing-up and the Arbitrary Alteration of the Task. — Mr. Emerson 
would strike out the statement that time and motion study elimi- 
nates the chief causes of speeding-up, and the arbitrary altera- 
tion of the task. As indicated above, he admits that scientific 
management is a speeding-up system, and that the task should 
always be subject to change for the purpose of keeping it fair.^ 

I. a. (3) (c). Time and Motion Study in Relation to Rate 
Cutting. — Mr. Taylor asserts that time and motion study elimi- 
nates the chief causes of rate cutting. Mr. Emerson refuses 

^ Interview, Nov. 18, 1914. 



LABOR CLAIMS: EMERSON SYSTEM 167 

to subscribe to this statement. "This," he says, "is a moral 
question. Scientific management has nothing tO' do with it." ^ 

J. h. The Attitude of the Worker towards Time and Motion 
Study and the Use of the Stop-Watch. — Mr. Emerson character- 
izes as "not true" the Taylor claim that time and motion study, 
with the use of the stop-watch, is not objected to by the 
workers when its purposes are properly explained and under- 
stood by the workers and when used openly and above board by 
men whose knowledge and ability the workers respect. 

"Some men," he says, "will object to the stop-watch under 
any circumstances." ^ "Others make no objections." ^ He has 
never had any trouble here, but he objects to this generaliza- 
tion. 

2. a. Task Setting under Scientific Management and its Ef- 
fects. — Mr. Emerson subscribes, in general, to the results 
claimed by Mr. Taylor for task setting and the modes of pay- 
ment employed by scientific management. He objects, how- 
ever, to task setting, itself. He prefers to ascribe the results 
claimed to planning, scheduling and dispatching. In this con- 
nection, he again objects strenuously to the "task." "The 
task," he declares, "carries with it the idea of distaste." ^ "A 
man cannot do good work when it is repugnant." ^ There- 
fore, he hates the word "task." ^ 

2. b. The Modes of Payment Employed by Scientific Manage- 
ment and Their Results. — Mr. Emerson subscribes to the Taylor 
claims as to the effects of the modes of payment employed by 
scientific management. However, he characterizes these claims 
as "relatively unimportant." ^ In this connection, Mr. Emer- 
son takes occasion to express himself as unqualifiedly opposed 
to piece rates. He "loathes" ^ piece rates, and considers them 
"the greatest obstacle to the introduction of scientific man- 
agement." ^ "I object to the piece rate method of payment," 
he declares, "because it is unscientific." ^ "Because it places 
human work in the same classification as material, something 
to be measured not by time but by volume, therefore, inciting 
to excess and overstrain; because it puts the responsibility for 
results on the worker, although the greater part of this respon- 
sibility rests with the management; because it makes no allow- 
ance for any other factor than output, so the child, girl or boy, 

interview, Nov. 18, 1914. 



i68 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

so the man, good or bad, healthy or unhealthy, intelligent or un- 
intelligent, is paid the same if equally strenuous; because it is 
often the manager's immediate interest to cut piece rates and 
the workers' own protection to limit output, because I have seen 
rates repeatedly cut until the good workers were driven out of 
the shop and the poor incompetent who remained had to start 
at 4 a. m. in order to earn a fair day's pay; because of these 
and many other injustices, I condemn the non-observance of 
principles, which, if they had been followed, would never have 
sanctioned this method of pay." ^ "Therefore," says Mr. Emer- 
son, "piece rates make his hair rise." ^ 

In the regulation of rates, Mr. Emerson, himself, emphasizes 
the psychological side of the problem. He has found it "un- 
desirable to pay a different bonus for different kinds of work 
as Taylor does." ^ He "gets the same results by varying the 
standard time." ^ He finds that "men have a secret objection 
to variation in rates but not so much to variation in time." ^ 
"The ordinary man never wants to beat the rate but usually 
takes interest in beating the time." ^ 

^ Interview, Nov. i8, 1914, and Efficiency in Modern Organisation, 
section 293. 



APPENDIX V 
The Trade Union Objections to Scientific Management 

A. Trade Union Objections Directed Against the Alleged 
General Character and Spirit of "Scientific Management." 

Organized labor understands by the term, "scientific manage- 
ment," certain well-defined "efficiency systems" which have been 
recently devised by individuals and small groups under the 
leadership or in imitation of men like Frederick W. Taylor, 
H, L. Gantt, and Harrington Emerson, by whom this term has 
been preempted. Organized labor makes a clear distinction be- 
tween "scientific management" thus defined and "science in 
management." It does not oppose savings of waste and in- 
crease of output resulting from improved machinery and truly 
efficient management. It stands, therefore, definitely commit- 
ted to "science in management," and its objections are directed 
solely against systems devised by the so-called "scientific man- 
agement" cult. Against "scientific management," thus de- 
fined, the trade unions charge that : 
I. "Scientific management" is a device employed for the pur- 
pose of increasing production and profits; and tends to 
eliminate consideration for the character, rights and wel- 
fare of the employees. 

a. It libels the character of the workmen. 

b. It looks upon the worker as a mere instrument of pro- 

duction. 

c. It ordinarily allows the workmen no voice in hiring 

or discharge, the setting of the task, the determina- 
tion of the wage rate, or of the general conditions 
of employment. 

d. In spirit and essence, so far as labor is concerned, it 

is a cunningly devised speeding-up and sweating sys- 
tem. 

169 



170 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

e. It is based on the principle of the survival of the fittest. 

2. "Scientific management" is opposed to industrial democ- 

racy; it is a reversion^to industrial autocracy. It forces 
the workers to depend upon the employers' conception 
of fairness, and limits the democratic safeguards of the 
workers. 

3. "Scientific management," in its relations to labor, is unsci- 

entific. 
a. It violates the fundamental principles of human nature 

by ignoring temperament and habits. 
h. It concerns itself almost wholly with the problem of 

production, disregarding, in general, the vital problem 

of distribution. 

c. It is unscientific in its determination of the task and the 

wage rate. 

d. It does not take all of the elements into consideration, 

but deals with human beings as it does with inanimate 
machines. 

4. "Scientific management" could be scientific and, at the 

same time, be inimical to the welfare of the workers. 

5. "Scientific management" does not tend to develop general 

and long-time economic efficiency. 

6. "Scientific management" tends to emphasize quantity of 

product at the expense of quality. 

7. "Scientific management" is incapable of extensive appli- 

cation. 

8. "Scientific management" is a theoretical conception already 

proven a failure in practice. 

B. Trade Union Objections Directed Against the Effects of 
"Scientific Management" Upon the Conditions of Work 
and the Character and Welfare of the Workers and So- 
ciety. 

The trade unions charge that: 

1. "Scientific management" greatly increases the number of 

"unproductive workers," that is, those engaged in cler- 
ical or supervisory work. 

2. "Scientific management" tends to gather up and transfer 

to the management all the traditional knowledge, the 



TRADE UNION OBJECTIONS 171 

judgment and the skill, and monopolizes the initiative of 
the worker in connection with the work. 

3. "Scientific management" intensifies the modern tendency ^/ 

toward extreme specialization of the work and the task. 

a. It splits up the work into a series of minute tasks. 

h. It tends to confine the worker to the continuous per- 
formance of one of these tasks. 

4. "Scientific management" displaces day work and day wages 

by task work and the piece rate, premium and bonus 
systems of payment. 

5. "Scientific management" is arbitrary in the setting of the 

task. 

a. It tends to set the task on the basis of "stunt" records 
of the strongest and swiftest workers without due 
allowance for the human element or unavoidable de- 
lays. 

&. It holds that if the task can be performed it is not too 
great. ' 

c. It shows a constant tendency to increase the intensity 
and extent of the task. 

6. "Scientific management" forces individuals to become "rush- 

ers" and "speeders." 

7. "Scientific management" tends to displace all but the fast- 

est workers. 

8. "Scientific management" greatly intensifies unnecessary 

managerial dictation and discipline. 

9. "Scientific management" has refused to deal with the work- 

ers except as individuals. 
ID. "Scientific management" tends to disregard the physical 

welfare of the workers. 
II. "Scientific management" through these attributes and 
methods : 
(i) Tends to deprive the worker of thought, initiative, 
sense of achievement and joy in his work. 

(2) Tends to eliminate skilled crafts. 

(3) Is destructive of mechanical education and skill. 

(4) Tends to deprive the worker of the possibility of 

learning a trade. 

(5) Puts a premium on muscle and speed rather than on 

brain. 



172 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

(6) Condemns the worker to a monotonous routine. 

(7) Dwarfs and represses the worker Intellectually. 

(8) Tends to destroy the individuality and inventive genius 

of the workers. 

(9) Stimulates and drives the workers up to the limit of 

nervous and physical exhaustion, and overfatigues 
and overstrains them. 

(10) Tends to undermine the workers' health. 

(11) Shortens the workers' period of industrial activity 

and earning power. 

(12) Increases the danger of industrial accidents. 

(13) Tends to destroy the workers' self-respect and self- 

restraint, and leads to habits of spending and in- 
temperance. 

(14) Tends to increase the number of punishable shop 

offenses, and the amount of docking of wages and 
fining. 

(15) Tends to prevent the presentation, and denies the 

consideration, of grievances. 

(16) Constitutes a species of industrial "third degree." 

(17) Creates the possibility of systematic blacklisting. 

(18) Destroys the independence and manhood of the 

workers. 

(19) Tends to reduce the workers to complete dependence 

upon the employers — to the condition of indus- 
trial serfs. 

(20) Introduces the spirit of mutual suspicion and con- 

test among the men, and thus destroys the soli- 
darity and cooperative spirit of the group. 

(21) Strikes at the root of workshop ethics. 

(22) Is incompatible with and destructive of collective 

bargaining. 

(23) Destroys all the protective rules and standards es- 

tablished by unionism. 

(24) Discriminates against union men. 

(25) Is incompatible with and destructive of trade union- 

ism. 

(26) Displaces the skilled workers and forces them into 

competition with the less skilled through specializa- 
tion of the task and destruction of craft skill. 



TRADE UNION OBJECTIONS 173 

(2y) Narrows the competitive field and weakens the bar- 
gaining strength of the workers. 

(28) Establishes a rigid standard of wages regardless of 

the progressive increase in the cost of living. 

(29) Puts a limit upon the amount of wages which any 

man can earn. 

(30) Often squeezes out of the workers vast overhead 

charges. 

(31) Offers no guarantee against rate cutting. 

(32) Is itself a systematic rate-cutting device. 

(33) Tends to lower the wages of many immediately and 

permanently. 

(34) Violates and indefinitely postpones the application of 

the fundamental principle of justice to distribution. 

(35) Means, in the long run, simply more work for the 

same or less pay. 

(36) Tends to lengthen the hours of labor. 

(37) Shortens the tenure of service and lessens the cer- 

tainty and continuity of employment. 

(38) Leads to overproduction and increase of unemploy- 

ment: 

a. In the particular group. 

b. In general. 

(39) Fails to satisfy the workers under it, but on the 

contrary, is regarded by them with extreme dis- 
taste. 

(40) Increases the antagonism between the workers and 

their employers. 

(41) Intensifies the conditions of industrial unrest. 

(42) Offers no guarantee against industrial warfare, and 

is conducive to strikes. 
12. Finally, "scientific management" puts into the hands of 
employers at large an immense mass of information and 
methods which may be used unscrupulously to the detri- 
ment of the workers, and offers no guarantee against the 
abuse of its professed principles and practices. 



174 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 



C. Trade Union Objections to Speciiic Features of "Scientific 
Management" Are Leveled Mainly Against Time Study 
and Motion Study, Task Work and the Piece-Rate, Pre- 
mium and Bonus Systems of Payment Employed by the 
Efficiency Experts. 

In this connection, they charge that: 

I. Time study and motion study are a direct attack upon the 
rights, dignity and welfare of the workers, are destruc- 
tive of skill and true efficiency, and are a menace to in- 
dustrial peace. 

a. They are unfair in method. 

b. They are an evidence of suspicion and a direct question 

of the honesty and fairness of the workers. 
C. They indicate a purpose on the part of the scientific 
managers and employers to extract the last ounce of 
energy out of the workers. 

d. They ignore habits and traditions of work, and tend to 

minimize the acquired skill of the workers. 

e. They split the work up into minute tasks, discover the 

utmost which the most efficient worker can do as a 
■"stunt" record, and enable the employer to substitute 
piece work where before day work prevailed, and to 
substitute various premium and bonus systems for 
the day wage and thus : 

(i) Increase the modern tendency toward speciali- 
zation. 

(2) Destroy the skilled crafts. 

(3) Deprive the worker of training. 

(4) Reduce his work to a monotonous routine. 

(5) Repress his thought and intelligence. 

(6) Reduce him to a semi-automatic attachment 

to the machine or tool. 

(7) Tend to destroy his initiative, ambition and 

inventive genius. 

(8) Encourage the piece work system. 

(9) Encourage the use of various premium and 

bonus systems. 

(10) Enable the employer to deal with the work- 



TRADE UNION OBJECTIONS 175 

ers as individuals, and thus to substitute 
individual for collective bargaining. 

(11) To pit workman against virorkman, 

(12) To introduce rushers and speeders. 

(13) To destroy the basis of vi^orkshop ethics. 

(14) To destroy unionism, and its protective rules 

and standards. 

(15) To speed the w^orker up beyond the point of 

physiological and mechanical safety. 

(16) To displace the ■ skilled w^orkers and force 

them into competition with the less skilled. 

(17) They thus lower wages and increase unem- 

ployment. 

(18) They tend to reduce the quality of the work 

and output. 

(19) They tend to destroy the health, and lessen 

the length of the productive period of the 
workers. 

(20) They increase the drastic character of the 

discipline. 

(21) They increase the possibilities of blacklisting. 

(22) They furnish no just or scientific basis for 

calculating the wage rate. 

(23) They increase the points of friction and are 

thus productive of industrial warfare. 
/. Time and motion study are not necessary to secure true 
efficiency, as all the data necessary for planning, rout- 
ing, cost accounting, task setting, and true efficiency 
in work can be secured without resort to elementary 
time study and motion analysis and the use of the 
stop-watch. 
2. The methods of work and remuneration employed by "sci- 
entific management," its basic wage, its task work, piece 
rate, premium and bonus system, are unscientific and un- 
just in principle; are, in practice, inimical to the wel- 
fare of the workers, and are productive of social unrest 
and industrial warfare. 
a. The basic wage of "scientific management" is simply 
the customary wage of the region for the class of 
labor employed. It has absolutely no foundation in 



176 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

science or justice, but is the outcome of the relative 
competitive strength of workers and employers, and 
is often estimated at the bare subsistence level or 
even below^. 

b. In accepting this wage as the basis of its "scientific" 

and just methods of remuneration, "scientific manage- 
ment" conveys the impression that it, the base wage, 
also is scientific and just, and tends thus to make it 
permanent at its present level — ^to fix general wages 
at the present rates. 

c. The premium and bonus rates which "scientific man- 

agement" imposes upon this basic wage are both 
unscientific and unjust to the workers employed. 
(i) They are determined not upon what the 
worker actually produces, and an attempt to 
approximate this, but upon a study of how 
little the worker must be given to insure his 
utmost effort, and upon how much the em- 
ployer must be given of the worker's extra 
product to buy him off from rate cutting. 

(2) They usually result in giving the worker less 

than the regular rate of pay for his extra 
exertion, and only a portion, and usually the 
smaller portion, of the product which his ex- 
tra exertion has created. They are usually 
less advantageous to the worker than straight 
piece work. 

(3) The premiums and bonuses are usually ar- 

ranged so that it is greatly to the advantage 
of the employers to prevent the workers from 
equaling or exceeding the task, and secur- 
ing extra payment therefor. 

(4) Therefore, the task is usually set so high that 

only a few of the strongest and most agile 
workers are capable of accomplishing it, and 
securing any bonus or premium. 

(5) There is a constant tendency to raise the task. 

(6) In the most advanced systems, there is a pun- 

ishment by means of the lowering of regu- 
lar rates, and the consequent loss of wage 



TRADE UNION OBJECTIONS 177 

for the workers who fail to make the task 
thus set, as in the case of differential piece 
rates. 

d. The methods of payment employed by "scientific man- 

agement," therefore: 

(i) Offer no guarantee against rate cutting, but, 
on the contrary, induce to systematic cutting 
of the rates. 

(2) Result usually in no gain over the customary 

wage for the most of the workers in the 
"scientific management" shops, and some- 
times in an actual lowering of the wage be- 
low the customary rate. 

(3) Result in the degradation of skilled to the con- 

dition of less skilled men. 

e. The modes of payment employed by "scientific manage- 

ment" : 

(i) Open the way for the employment of rushers 
and speeders. 

(2) Introduce the contest principle among the 

workers. 

(3) Displace harmony and cooperation among the 

working group by mutual suspicion and con- 
troversy. 

(4) Make collective bargaining practically impos- 

sible. 

(5) Prevent the enforcement of the protective 

standards and rules of unionism. 

(6) Destroy the union spirit and organization. 

(7) Induce and compel overspeeding and over- 

exertion. 

(8) Tend to undermine the health of the workers 

and bring on premature old age. 

(9) Increase the dangers of industrial accidents. 

(10) Jeopardize the quality of the product. 

(11) Lead to overproduction and unemployment. 

(12) Lead to a general lowering of wages and the 

standards of living among the workers. 

f. The modes of payment employed by "scientific manage- 

ment" are not necessary to true efficiency. 



APPENDIX VI 

Vital Points at Issue Between Scientific Management 
AND Labor Based Upon the Labor Claims of Scientific 
Managers 

1. Does scientific management assign to each worker a defi- 

nite and accomplishable task? 

2. Does scientific management substitute exact knowledge 

for guesswork in the setting of the task? 

3. Does scientific management set the task on the basis of 

careful studies of fatigue? 

4. Does scientific management set the task on the basis of 

scientific, physiological and psychological studies of the 
individual workers concerned? 

5. Does scientific management in the setting of the task base 

the allowance for the human element on careful psy- 
chological studies? 

6. Does scientific management set the task on the basis of 

a large number of performances by men of different 
capacities ? 

7. Does scientific management set the task with reference 

to the long-time capacity of the workers and long-time 
results ? 

8. Does scientific management in setting the task thus make 

due and scientific allowance for the human factor? 

9. Does scientific management in setting the task make due 

and scientific allowance for unavoidable breakdowns 
and legitimate delays? 

10. Are elementary time study and motion study necessary 

to the setting of the task with due and scientific allow- 
ance for the human factor, unavoidable breakdowns 
and legitimate delays? 

11. Does scientific management systematically attempt to as- 

178 



VITAL POINTS AT ISSUE 179 

sign the workmen to tasks to which they are especially 
adapted ? 

12. Does scientific management substitute exact knowledge 

for guesswork in the assignment of the character of 
the task ? 

13. Does scientific management actually and systematically 

determine the character of the task to which each 
workman is set by means of scientific, physiological 
and psychological studies of the worker? 

14. Does scientific management thus make possible the sci- 

entific selection of the workmen, i.e., the mutual adap- 
tation of the task and the worker? 

15. Is scientific management thus a practical system of vo- 

cational guidance and training? 

16. Are elementary time study and motion study necessary 

for the scientific adaptation of the task and the worker ? 

17. Does scientific management require each worker to learn 

and to perform not one but several tasks, wherever 
possible? 

18. Does scientific management make economically possible 

the systematic routing of the workers through the shop? 

19. Does scientific management thus mitigate the evil effects 

upon the workers of the modern tendency toward spe- 
cialization caused by machine production? 

20. Are time and motion study necessary for the proper rout- 

ing of the workers in the shop, as well as of the jobs 
and materials? 

21. Does scientific management eliminate pacesetters? 

22. Does scientific management turn speeders into instruc- 

tors? 

23. Are the modes of payment employed by scientific manage- 

ment necessary for the elimination of the need for 
pacesetters and the turning of speeders into instruc- 
tors? 

24. Does scientific management eliminate systematic soldier- 



ing 



25. Are time and motion study and the modes of payment 

employed by scientific management necessary to the 
elimination of systematic soldiering? 

26. Is the speed of the men under scientific management set 



i8o SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

with reference to long-time effects upon the workers 
and long-time productive results? 

27. Does scientific management institute rational rest periods 

and modes of recreation during the working hours ? 

28. Is it true that the so-called speeding-up of scientific man- 

agement is mainly a speeding-up of machinery which 
involves no extra exertion on the part of the workers? 

29. Are any overstrained or overworked employees to be 

found in scientific management shops? 

30. Do time and motion study eliminate the chief causes of 

speeding-up ? 

31. Does scientific management thus guard the workers 

against overspeeding and exhaustion nervously and 
physically ? 

32. Does scientific management train the workers in the 

most economical and easiest methods of performing op- 
erations ? 

33. Are time and motion study necessary to the determination 

of the most efficient methods of performing the work? 

34. Do time and motion study and scientific task setting pro- 

mote the training of the workmen ? 

35. Do the modes of payment employed by scientific man- 

agement turn foremen into instructors? 

36. Does scientific management instruct and train workers 

by means of a corps of competent specialists? 

37. Does scientific management bring all the workers into 

close, systematic and helpful touch with the manage- 
ment? 

38. Does scientific management thus systematically transmit 

to the workers all the traditional craft knowledge and 
skill which is being lost and destroyed under current 
industrial methods? 

39. Does scientific management eliminate avoidable break- 

downs and delays? 

40. Does scientific management furnish each workman with 

the best tools and materials at the proper time and 
place ? 

41. Are time and motion study necessary in order to furnish 

each workman with the tools and materials at the 
proper time and place? 



VITAL POINTS AT ISSUE i8i 

42. Does scientific management standardize equipment and 

performance ? 

43. Does scientific management remove from the worker re- 

sponsibility for determining the best methods of work? 

44. Does scientific management remove from the worker the 

responsibility for the work of others? 

45. Does scientific management remove from the worker re- 

sponsibility for the instruction of beginners and helpers ? 

46. Does scientific management reward the men for helpful 

suggestions and improvements in methods of work? 

47. Does scientific management substitute the rule of natural 

law for arbitrary decisions of foremen and employers 
in matters of shop discipline and other conditions of 
employment ? 

48. Does scientific management thus eliminate favoritism in 

the shop? 

49. Does scientific management eliminate the arbitrary bully- 

ing of foremen? 

50. Does scientific management thus lessen the rigors of 

shop discipline? 

51. Does scientific management thus give to the workers an 

equal voice with the employers in shop discipline? 

52. Does scientific management thus give a voice to the 

workers in matters of hiring and discharge, the setting 
of the task, the determination of the wage rate, and 
the general conditions of employment? 

53. Does scientific management give to the workers an equal 

voice with the employers in these matters? 

54. Does scientific management thus democratize industry? 

55. Does scientific management treat each worker as an in- 

dependent personality? 

56. Does scientific management pay men rather than posi- 

tions, and reward each workman in exact proportion 
to his efficiency? 

57. Are elementary time and motion study necessary in or- 

der that each worker should be rewarded in exact pro- 
portion to his efficiency? 

58. Are the modes of payment employed by scientific manage- 

ment necessary in order that each worker should be 
rewarded in exact proportion to his efficiency? 



i82 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

59. Does scientific management provide immediate rewards 

for increased efficiency or improved output? 

60. Does scientific management, by all these means and 

methods : 

a. Stimulate the thought and ambition of the workers? 

b. Mitigate the monotony incident to modern machine 

industry ? 

c. Develop the sense of personal achievement of the 

worker ? 

d. Put interest, joy and zest into the work? 

e. Stimulate the workers' inventive genius? 
/. Energize the workers intellectually? 

g. Promote the workers' self-reliance, self-respect, in- 
dividuality, personality, and dignity? 

h. Develop and broaden the mechanical skill of the 
workers ? 

*. Train the workers mechanically as they were never 
trained before? 

j. Tend to induce in the workers habits of industry, tem- 
perance and saving, and elevate them morally and 
socially ? 

k. Eliminate the suspicions of the employers that the men 
are soldiering or gaining an unfair advantage? 

I. Promote a friendly feeling between the management 
and the men? 

m. Prevent suspicions and complaints of the management 
by the men? 

n. Eliminate suspicion of the management by the men? 

0. Cause the workers to regard their employers as their 
best friends? 

p. Make the men in the shoo more manly, truthful, and 
straightforward ? 

q. Eliminate the hampering of the strong and willing by 
the weak and unwilling? 

r. Prevent the more efficient workers from being held 
back and demoralized by the inefficient? 

s. Promote friendly feeling and action among the work- 
ers of the shop group ? Make the workers under sci- 
entific management more cheerful and helpful than 
under the old form of management? 



VITAL POINTS AT ISSUE 183 

t. Set each man to the highest task for which his phys- 
ical and intellectual capacity fits him? 

u. Open the way for all workmen to become "first-class 
men" in some employment? 

V. Insure just treatment of the individual worker? 

61. Does scientific management thus increase efficiency and 

productivity of the workers? 

62. Are the time and motion study and the modes of pay- 

ment employed by scientific management necessary to 
the increase of efficiency and output? 

63. Does scientific management make possible the increase 

of efficiency and output with less effort on the part 
of the workers? 

64. Does scientific managefnent purchase labor by specifi- 

cation, and thus tend to insure justice to both par- 
ties? 

65. Does scientific management substitute exact knowledge 

for guesswork in the payment of wages — pay a wage 
which is exactly equivalent to the workers' efficiency 
or worth? 

66. Are time and motion study necessary in order to sub- 

stitute exact knowledge for guesswork in wage pay- 
ment? 
6y. Does scientific management raise the wages of workers 
in scientific management shops? 

68. Does scientific management raise the wages of both the 

skilled and unskilled workers ? 

69. Does scientific management tend to raise wages generally ? 

70. Does scientific management lower the labor cost while 

raising wages? 

71. Does scientific management prevent the placing of any 

arbitrary limit upon the amount which any worker may 
earn? 

72. Are time and motion study necessary for exact cost pre- 

diction ? 

73. Do time and motion study tend to eliminate ignorant bid- 

ding? 

74. Do time and motion study, therefore, eliminate the chief 

causes of the arbitrary alteration of the task, and ar- 
bitrary rate cutting? 



i84 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

75. Do the modes of payment employed by scientific man- 

agement tend to guarantee against rate cutting? 

76. Is it true that under scientific management the rate is 

never cut without an absolute change in the directions 
governing the w^ork and the time demanded for doing 
it? 
yy. Does scientific management, therefore, prevent arbitrary 
rate cutting? 

78. Does scientific management substitute exact knowledge 

for guesswork in the determination of the hours of 
work? 

79. Does scientific management tend to shorten the hours of 

work? 

80. Does scientific management surround the workers with 

the safest and most sanitary shop environment? 

81. Does scientific management improve the workers' health? 

82. Does scientific management raise the old age limit of the 

workers, lengthen the lives and earning capacity of the 
workers ? 

83. Does scientific management tend to eliminate split shifts 

or the "on-and-off" system of work? 

84. Does scientific management lessen the number of part- 

time workers? 

85. Does scientific management lessen the necessity of a shop 

reserve of workers? 

86. Does scientific management increase the security of em- 

ployment of the individual worker? 

87. Does scientific management increase the continuity of 

employment of the individual worker? 

88. Does scientific management broaden the field of industrial 

activity and competition of the individual worker? 

89. Does scientific management open up to all workers ex- 

tensive opportunities for promotion and advancement? 

90. Does scientific management tend to prevent the displace- 

ment and degradation of skilled workers? 

91. Does scientific management make collective bargaining 

unnecessary as a protection to the workers? 

92. Does scientific management make trade unions and trade 

union regulations unnecessary as a protection to the 
workers ? 



VITAL POINTS AT ISSUE 185 

93. Does scientific management, however, welcome the co- 

operation of unionism and unionists? If so, how? 

94. Is it true that time and motion study, with the use of 

the stop-watch, is not objected to by the workers when 
its features are properly explained and understood by 
the workers, and when it is used openly and above- 
board by men whose knowledge and ability the workers 
respect ? 

95. Are time and motion study under scientific management 

generally so explained and used? 

96. Does scientific management tend to prevent strikes and 

industrial warfare? 

97. Does scientific management tend to increase the employ- 

ment of labor in the trades and industries where it is 
installed? 

98. Does scientific management tend to lessen thus the dan- 

ger of unemployment? 

99. Does scientific management make possible a more ac- 

curate adjustment of supply and demand, and so tend 
to eliminate overproduction, unemployment, crises and 
depression ? 

100. Does scientific management set the task with due refer- 
ence to the relation between quantity and quality? 

loi. Does scientific management improve the quality of the 
product ? 

102. Are the workers under scientific management satisfied 

with the conditions of work and pay? 

103. Does scientific management tend to eliminate the causes 

of social unrest? 

104. Is scientific management capable of wide-spread applica- 

tion? 

105. To what extent are the systems of fact and law, upon 

which scientific management is supposed to be based, 
actually worked out and put into actual practice ? 

106. Is scientific management a system devised by industrial 

engineers rather than by employers ? 

107. Is scientific management really based upon a belief in 

harmony of interests between employers and workers? 

108. Is scientific management, in practice, used to subserve 

the common interests of employers, workmen, and so- 



i86 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

ciety at large, for the elimination of avoidable wastes, 
the general improvement of the processes and methods 
of production, and the just and scientific distribution 
of the product? 



APPENDIX VII 

Vital Points at Issue Between Scientific Management 
AND Labor Based Upon the Trade Union Objections to 
Scientific Management 

1. Does scientific management split up the work, whenever 

possible, into a series of minute tasks? 

2. Does scientific management tend to confine each worker 

to the continuous performance of one particular task? 

3. Does scientific management thus tend to intensify or 

exaggerate the modern tendency toward extreme spe- 
cialization of the work and the task? 

4. Does scientific management thus tend to eliminate skilled 

crafts ? 

5. Does scientific management- thus enable the employer to 

substitute piece work where day work before prevailed ? 

6. Does scientific management displace day work by piece 

work, where before day work prevailed? 

7. Does scientific management systematically attempt to sub- 

stitute piece work, premium and bonus systems of pay- 
ment in place of the day wage? 

8. Are time and motion study, as employed by scientific man- 

agement, arbitrary and unfair in method? 

9. Do time and motion study, as employed by scientific man- 

agement, indicate a purpose to extract the last ounce 
of energy from the workers? 

10. Is scientific management arbitrary in the setting of the 

task; does it allow the workers any voice in the set- 
ting of the task? 

11. Does scientific management determine the task by means 

of "stunt" records of the strongest and swiftest 
workers ? 

12. Does scientific management, in its determination of the 

task by means of time and motion study, make any just 
187 



i88 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

or scientific allowance for the human factor or unavoid- 
able breakdowns and delays? 

13. Does scientific management consistently increase the ex- 

tent and severity of the task? 

14. Does scientific management hold that if the task can be 

performed it is not too great? 

15. Does scientific management tend to increase the number 

of punishable shop offenses which may be committed by 
the workmen? 

16. Does scientific management tend to increase the amount 

of "docking" and "fining" ? 

17. Does scientific management otherwise greatly intensify 

unnecessary managerial dictation and the severity of 
the discipline; is it a species of industrial "third de- 
gree" ? 

18. Does scientific management force individuals to become 

"rushers" and "speeders" ? 

19. Does scientific management tend to deprive the worker 

of all opportunity for rest, recreation and sociability 
during the time of work? 

20. Is scientific management, so far as the workers are con- 

cerned, a speeding-up system; does it, by its methods, 
stimulate and drive the workers up to and beyond 
the point of nervous and physical endurance and ex- 
haustion? 

21. Are time and motion study, as employed by scientific 

management, evidence of unjust suspicion of the hon- 
esty and fairness of the workers? 

22. Are time and motion study, as employed by scientific man- 

agement, a direct attack upon the honesty, fairness 
and dignity of the workers? 

23. Does scientific management libel the character of the 

workmen ? 

24. Does scientific management tend to gather up and trans- 

fer to the management all the traditional knowledge 
and judgment, and monopolize the initiative of the 
workers in connection with the work? 

25. Does scientific management force the workers to follow 

strictly minute instructions in the performance of the 
task? 



VITAL POINTS AT ISSUE 189 

26. Does scientific management look upon the worker, and 

treat him as a mere instrument of production? 
2,^. Does scientific management deal with human beings as it 

does with inanimate machines ? 
28. Does scientific management, by all these methods : 

a. Enable the unskilled and underpaid to compete with 

the skilled? 
h. Put a premium on muscle and speed rather than on 
brain? 

c. Tend to deprive the worker of thought, judgment, 

initiative in connection with his work? 

d. Tend to minimize the acquired skill of the workers? 

e. Tend to destroy the craftsmanship and craft skill of 

the worker? 

/. Tend to deprive the workers of the opportunity of 
learning a trade? 

g. Deprive the worker of industrial and mechanical train- 
ing? 

h. Reduce the worker to a semi-automatic attachment to 

the machine or tool? 
i. Narrow the scope, and increase the monotony of work, 
and practically condemn the worker to a fixed monot- 
onous routine? 

y. Decrease the general and long-time efficiency of the 
workers ? 

(i) Those retained 
(2) Those discharged 

k. Narrow the industrial capacity of the worker ? 

I. Narrow the workers' field of industrial and competi- 
tive activity? 

m. Deprive the workers of the hope of future advance- 
ment? 

n. Tend to destroy the individuality of the worker? 

0. Tend to destroy the initiative of the worker? 

p. Destroy the sense of achievement of the worker? 

q. Destroy the worker's joy and pride in his work? 

r. Tend to destroy the independence of the worker? 

S. Tend to destroy the dignity and manhood of the 
worker ? 

t. Tend to destroy the ambition of the worker? 



190 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

u. Tend to suppress and destroy the inventive genius of 

the worker? 
V. Overstrain and fatigue the workers nervously and 

physically ? 
w. Repress and dwarf the workers intellectually? 
X. Tend to undermine the worker's health and bring upon 

the worker premature old age? 
y. Increase the danger of industrial accidents? 

29. Is scientific management destructive of mechanical edu- 

cation and skill? 

30. Does scientific management thus tend to induce in the 

worker habits of loafing, dissipation and spending? 

31. Does scientific management tend to shorten the period 

of industrial activity and earning power of the workers? 
^ 32. Does scientific management introduce the contest prin- 
ciple among the workers and pit man against man? 

33. Does scientific management displace all but the fastest' 

workers ? 

34. Does scientific management, displace the spirit of mutual- 

ity and harmony in the working group by mutual sus- 
picion and distrust? 

35. Does scientific management thus destroy the basis of 

workshop ethics? 

36. Does scientific management refuse to deal with the work- 

ers' representatives? 

37. Does scientific management refuse to deal with repre- 

sentatives of the workers who are not in its employ? 

38. Does scientific management refuse to deal with union 

officials ? 

39. Does scientific management refuse to deal with the men 

except as individuals? 

40. Does scientific management tend to prevent the presen- 

tation and deny the consideration of grievances? 

41. Does scientific management, ordinarily, refuse to allow 

the workers any voice in hiring, discharge, setting 
of the task and other conditions of work, or in deter- 
mining the wage rate or the modes and conditions of 
payment? Is scientific management, as alleged, arbi- 
trary in these matters? 

42. Does scientific management force the workers to depend 



VITAL POINTS AT ISSUE 191 

upon the employers' conception of fairness in all these 
matters ? 

Is scientific management thus: 

a. Inimical to collective bargaining? 

h. Does it tend to destroy collective bargaining? 

c. Is it incompatible with collective bargaining? 

Does scientific management destroy or make impossible 
of enforcement all the protective standards and rules 
which have been established by trade unionism? 

Does scientific management discriminate against union- 
ism? 

Is scientific management thus: 

a. Opposed to trade unionism? 

h. Inimical to trade unionism? In spirit and theory? 
In practice? 

c. Does it tend to destroy trade unionism? 

d. Is it incompatible with trade unionism? 

Where unions exist, do they make the practice of effi- 
ciency and scientific management impossible? 

Are the premium, bonus and dif¥erential piece rates of 
scientific management based upon a study of how little 
the worker must be given to purchase his utmost ef- 
fort, and upon how much the employer must be given 
of the worker's extra product to buy him off from rate 
cutting? 

Are the premium, bonus and differential piece rates of 
scientific management usually less advantageous to the 
worker than straight piece rates? 

Are the premium, bonus and differential piece rates of 
scientific management usually so calculated as to give 
the worker less than the regular rate of pay for his 
extra exertion and output above the established stand- 
ard task? 

Are the premium, bonus and differential piece rates of 
scientific management usually so calculated as to give 
the worker only a portion, and usually the lesser portion, 
of the product that his extra exertion has created, 
above the standard task? 

Are the premium, bonus and differential piece rates 
usually so calculated under scientific management as 



192 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

to make it greatly to the advantage of the employer 
to prevent the mass of the workers from equaling or 
exceeding the task, i.e., to keep the task just beyond 
the reach of the majority of the workers? 

53. Under scientific management, is the task usually set so 

high that only a few of the strongest and most capable 
can accomplish it? 

54. Do the great majority of the workers, under scientific 

management, actually fail to make the task, and secure 
the bonuses and premiums, or higher differential piece 
rates ? 

55. Are the workers under scientific management who fail to 

make the task usually severely punished by docking, 
demotion or discharge? 

56. Are the foremen under scientific management usually 

paid according to the number of men or machines which 
make the tasks ? 

57. Is scientific management, then, in spirit and essence, a 

sweating system? 

58. Does scientific management greatly increase the number 

of unproductive workers? 

59. Does scientific management often squeeze out of the 

workers vast overhead charges? 

60. Does scientific management lower the wages of the work- 

ers in scientific management shops, as compared with 

the customary wages? 
a. The few. 
h. The many. 

61. Does scientific management offer any guarantee against 

rate cutting? 

62. Does scientific management place a limit upon the earning 

power of the men? 
6t,. Is scientific management, itself, a systematic rate-cutting 
device ? 

64. Does scientific management cut the wages of those who 

fail to make the task below the customary wage stand- 
ard? 

65. Does scientific management tend to establish a rigid 

standard of wages regardless of the progressive in- 
crease in the cost of living? 



VITAL POINTS AT ISSUE 193 

66. Does scientific management tend to fix the present cus- 

tomary wage permanently at its existing level? 

67. Does scientific management tend to lengthen the hours 

of labor? 

68. Does scientific management, if successful, tend to create 

overproduction 
a. In the group or trade? 
h. In general ? 

69. Does scientific management tend to increase the number 

of part-time workers? 

70. Does scientific management, if successful, tend to create 

unemployment ? 
a. In the group or trade? 
h. In general? 

71. Does scientific management displace the skilled workers 

and force them into competition with the less skilled? 

72. Does scientific management enable the employer to sub- 

stitute unskilled and low-priced men for high-priced 
and skilled workers at a moment's notice? 

73. Does scientific management result in the degradation of 

the skilled to the condition of less skilled men? 

74. Does scientific management tend to increase the uncer- 

tainty and discontinuity of labor? 
a. In the industry. 
h. In general. 

75. Does scientific management, by all these means, lessen 

the bargaining power of the workers generally? 
y6. Does scientific management, by all these means, tend to 

reduce the workers to absolute dependence upon the 

employers ? 
yy. Does scientific management tend to lower the wages of 

the many permanently? 

78. Does scientific management, in the long run, mean simply 

more work for the same or less pay? 

79. Does scientific management tend to lower the standard 

of living of the workers? 

80. Is scientific management, in its relations to labor, really 

scientific ? 
a. Does it violate the fundamental principles of human 
nature by ignoring temperament and habits ? 



194 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

b. Is it scientific in the determination of the task? 

c. Does it disregard, in general, the vital problem of dis- 

tribution ? 

d. Has the basic wage of scientific management any foun- 

dation in science or justice? 

e. Are the premium, bonus and differential piece rates 

of scientific management scientifically established? 

f. Does it take all of the elements into consideration? 

g. Does it deal with human beings as it does with the 

inanimate machine? 

81. Can a scientific wage rate or system be determined and 

established ? 

82. Does scientific management violate and indefinitely post- 

pone the application of the fundamental principle of 
justice to distribution? 

83. Could scientific management be really scientific, and, at 

the same time, be inimical to the welfare of the 
workers ? 

84. Is scientific management, by its assumption of a scientific 

nature, inimical to the welfare of the workers? 

85. Does scientific management effect any improvement in 

the general conditions of the shop — heat, light, sanita- 
tion, congestion, etc. ? 

86. Does scientific management tend to disregard the phys- 

ical welfare of the workers? 

87. Does scientific management tend to develop general and 

long-time economic efficiency? 

88. Are elementary time study and motion study and the use 

of the stop-watch necessary to secure true shop effi- 
ciency ? 

89. Are task setting, piece rates, and the premium and bonus 

systems of payment of scientific management necessary 
to secure true shop efficiency? 

90. Does scientific management tend to emphasize quantity 

of product at the expense of quality? 

91. Is scientific management capable of any widespread ap- 

plication ? 

92. Is scientific management a theoretical conception already 

proven a failure in practice? 

93. Are the workers satisfied with scientific management, con- 



VITAL POINTS AT ISSUE 195 

sidering not only the present workers in the shops, but 
those who have fallen out and outside workers? 

94. Has scientific management created a spirit of antagonism 

between employers and workers? 

95. Do the workers under scientific management look upon 

their employers as their friends? 

96. Have there been strikes under scientific management? 

97. Does scientific management tend to accentuate industrial 

warfare ? 

98. Is scientific management a guardian of industrial peace, 

or does it offer any guarantee of industrial peace? 

99. Is scientific management opposed to industrial democracy ? 
100. Is scientific management a reversion to industrial autoc- 
racy? 

loi. Is scientific management a device of the employer for 
the purpose of increasing production and profit, re- 
gardless of consideration for the character, rights, and 
welfare of the employed? 

102. Is scientific management based upon the principle of 

the survival of the fittest? 

103. Does scientific management put into the hands of em- 

ployers at large an immense mass of information and 
methods which may be used unscrupulously to the 
detriment of the worker? 

104. Does scientific management increase the possibilities of 

blacklisting? 

105. Does scientific management offer any guarantee that the 

information and methods which it puts into the hands 
of employers in general will not be used to the detri- 
ment of the workers, i.e., in abuse of its professed prin- 
ciples and practices? 

106. Does scientific management satisfy the sense of justice 

of the workers in general? 

107. Does scientific management tend to accentuate the causes 

of industrial unrest? 



APPENDIX VIII 

QUESTIONNAIRE 

Scientific Management and Labor 

Investigation by the United States Commission on Industrial 

Relations 

investigator 
Robert F. Hoxie 



1915 



LIST OF SCHEDULES 

I. The General Character and Organization of 

THE Plant. 
II. Time and Motion Study. 

III. Task Setting. 

III. A. Standardization of Efficiency. 

IV. Wages. 

IV. A. The Differential Piece Rate System. 
IV. B. The Task and Bonus System. 
IV. C. The Premium System. 
IV. D. The Piece-Rate System. 
V. Hiring, Discharge, Discipline, Security and 

Continuity of Employment. 
VI. Vocational Selection, Specialization, Stand- 

ardization, Instruction and Training, Ad- 
vancement, Promotion and Demotion of Work- 
ers. 
VII. A. Effect on Character and Relations of Workers. 
VII. B. Effect on Character and Relations of Workers. 
VIII. Collective Bargaining and Trade Unionism. 

IX. Cooperative Possibilities. 



PREFACE 

SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

These schedules are based upon two documents which have 
been prepared in consultation with the parties interested, and 
which have received their criticism and approval, viz. : 

A. The Labor Claims of Scientific Management. 

B. The Trade Union Objections to Scientific Manage- 

ment. 

These two documents together raise over 200 points of direct 
issue, i. e., 200 questions which this investigation is bound to 
attempt to answer. 

The most practical approach, therefore, to the data neces- 
sary to answer these questions is to frame them in such a way 
as to get at the primary elements of the situation, as has been 
attempted in the following schedules. Questions aimed merely 
at compound facts are useless. 

Managers of scientific management shops will undoubtedly 
think of additional questions needed to bring out elemental 
facts. The attempt here has merely been made to do the utmost 
that could be done in advance, to make their task as easy for 
them as possible, and to standardize the inquiry, as far as 
can be done at this time, so as to make the answers comparable. 

The fullest information is desired which will tend to bring 
out the distinct character and significance of the various fea- 
tures of scientific management, both in theory and practice, 
and, wherever the questions are not so framed as to bring 
out the special characteristics or modifications of any system 
in a certain plant, the managers answering are invited to insert 
supplementary or additional questions which more nearly illus- 
trate their particular point of view. 

Definition of Terms. — In all questions in the following sched- 
ules, the terms workers, wage-workers and wage-working em- 

199 



200 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

ployees, as here used, unless otherwise specified, are defi- 
nitely understood to mean workers in the shop engaged in direct 
labor in handling materials, tools or machinery. These terms, 
in all answers to questions given, are understood to exclude 
foremen and assistant foremen in the shop, employees whose 
main services are in the planning room, messengers, and all 
office workers. 



SCHEDULE I 
The General Character and Organization of the Plant 

1. What is the style or name of this* enterprise? 

2. What is the industrial type (corporation, partnership, 

etc.)? 

3. What is the general nature of the industry? Into what 

departments or sections is the establishment divided, 
and what is the character of the product turned out in 
each department or section? 

4. Name the officers and briefly designate their duties. 

5. What is the number of wage working employees? 
a. Normally. 

h. At present. 

6. If this is a scientific management establishment: 
a. What system or systems does it represent? 

h. When was the installation of scientific management 
begun? 

c. Under whose direction was the installation of scientific 

management begun, and by whose direction continued ? 
Give names and periods of service. 

d. Has scientific management been applied to the estab- 

lishment as a whole ? 

e. If scientific management has been applied to the estab- 

lishment as a whole: 

1. Is the installation complete? If so, give date of 

completion. 

2. If incomplete, what proportion of the whole has 

been done? 

3. Who were the systematizers or experts in charge, 

and what were the periods of service of each? 

4. Tabulate number of workers under 16 years of 

age, 16-20, 20-30, 30-40, 40-50, 50-60, desig- 
nating sex and conjugal condition. 
201 



202 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

a. Normally. 

b. At present. 

c. What nationalities are represented and in 

what proportions? 
/. If scientific management has been applied to part of 

the establishment only, to what part or sections has 

it been applied? 
g. In the case of each of these parts or sections to which 

scientific management has been applied: 

1. What is the nature of the work? 

2. Is the installation complete; if so, give date of 

completion. 

3. If incomplete, what work, and what proportion 

of the whole work has been done ? 

4. Who have been the systematizers or. experts in 

charge, and what have been the periods of 
service in each case? 

7. In the installation of scientific management in this plant: 

a. From whom did the initiative come? 

b. What were the motives and purposes of those who 

desired the installation? 

c. What conditions led to the installation? 

d. Did the workers have any voice in deciding whether 

scientific management should be installed or not? If 
so, what? 

8. State the special conditions under which the plant has 

been operating since the installation of scientific man- 
agement or at the present time, which might have inter- 
fered or now interfere with the normality of the situa- 
tion and with results. 

9. Is it the ideal and purpose to establish one system of 

work and mode of payment for all the wage-working 
employees of this establishment? If so, what? 
10. What systems of work and modes of payment are actually 
in use? 

a. Day work and day wage? 

b. Piece work and piece wage? 

c. The Differential Piece-Rate system? 

d. The Task and Bonus system? 

e. The Premium system? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 203 

/. Any other system or systems? 

g. Profit-sharing in connection with any of these plans or 
systems ? 

11. For what kinds of work and classes of employees are the 

different systems or plans of payment in use employed, 
to what extent, and for what reasons are they employed 
in each case ? 

12. Is a definite standard task set the worker, and, if so, in 

connection with what systems of work and modes of 
payment ? 

13. For what kinds of work is the task set, and what are the 

number and proportion of the wage-workers in the es- 
tablishment operating under the task system? 

14. Is it designed to extend the task system? If so, why? 

If not, why not? 

15. Is the task set primarily with reference to a piece of 

work, or to a period of time occupied? If the latter, 
what are the standard units of time? 

16. Is a definite standard scale of work or accomplishment 

established for workers, and, if so, in connection with 
what systems of work and modes of payment? 

17. For what kinds of work is the standard scale of accom- 

plishment employed, and what are the number and pro- 
portion of wage-workers in the establishment operating 
under this system? 

18. Is it designed to extend this system? If so, why? If 

not, why not? 

19. Is the scale of accomplishment fixed primarily with ref- 

erence to a piece of work or to a period of time occu- 
pied? If the latter, what are the standard units of 
time? 

20. Is the sales department able to secure a regular supply 

of orders for the plant? 
a. In normal times. 
h. At present. 

21. Does this establishment manufacture only for orders or 

for stock, and if chiefly for orders, what part of the 
work can be done economically for stock in an attempt 
to regularize production? 

22. Has the plant capacity for the manufacture of by-prod- 



204 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

ucts or of supplementary products, through which it can 
regularize production? 
2^. Is production seasonal? If so, in what way and to what 
extent ? 

24. Has the plant a central planning room ? Are there branch 

planning departments? 

25. How many employees in the planning room are persons 

promoted from the shop ? How many have been brought 
in from outside? 

26. Describe in brief the general system of industrial opera- 

tion employed in this establishment, i. e., the steps in 
the process of turning out an order from the time it is 
received until it is ready for delivery. Illustrate with 
blank forms. 

27. In this establishment, what is the proportion of the so- 

called unproductive to the productive workers, i. e., the 
proportion of those engaged in clerical or supervisory 
work as compared with those working in the shop with 
tools, machinery and materials? 

28. Select a department of the plant that you consider most 

typical of your scheme of organization, and state to 
what person or persons a worker, going to work in that 
department, is immediately and directly responsible. 

29. Who stands next in the line of responsibility above these 

persons or this person? 

30. Give the line of responsibility as far as it goes, and 

wherever the worker is responsible to two or more per- 
sons for different functions, are there any gaps or over- 
lapping between these functions? 

31. Give a brief summary statement of the methods of ascer- 

taining costs. 

32. To what extent has the output of your plant increased 

under scientific management? 

33. To what extent is the increase of output in your estab- 

lishment, since the installation of scientific management, 
due to new or better equipment or relocation of ma- 
chinery ? 

34. Aside from time and motion studies and the modes of 

payment, what special means have been contrived or 
adopted in this establishment, for the saving of waste. 



QUESTIONNAIRE 205 

the saving of time, the increase of efficiency and output, 
and the improvement of the quaUty of the product? 
Give specific descriptions. 

35. What proportion of the increase of efficiency and output, 
which has resulted from the installation of scientific 
management in this establishment, do you ascribe to 
improved methods and contrivances as over against in- 
creased efficiency emanating from the workers them- 
selves ? 

7,6. Does scientific management, in this establishment, stand- 
ardize equipment, tools and materials? If so, to what 
extent and in what ways do the workers profit by the 
standardization of tools, materials, etc. ? 

37. Do the modes of payment employed by scientific manage- 

ment tend to fix the attention of the worker on quantity 
of output and so endanger the quality of the product? 

a. If not, why not? 

h. If so, how does scientific management offset this tend- 
ency? 

38. Does scientific management, in this establishment, improve 

the quality of the product? If so, how? If not, why 
not? 

39. Are the cost accounts of the plant completely tied into 

the commercial accounts of the plant? 

40. Does the authority in the plant which has charge of 

financial arrangements have thorough general knowledge 
of the problems of works management? 

41. Under scientific management, is the worker considered 

an expense or an investment, and, if as an investment, 
why? 

42. Is there any form of minimum wage in operation in the 

plant ? 
a. By an hourly rate. 
h. By a day rate. 
c. By a weekly rate. 

43. Is the labor of the plant purchased by specifications? If 

so, to what extent; what is the nature of the specifica- 
tions ? 

44. Is the plant, in whole or in part, a union shop, an open 

shop, a preferential shop or a non-union shop? 



2o6 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

45. In so far as it is unionized, with what unions are the 

employees affiliated? 

46. Are there any internal organizations of employees? If 

so, what are their character and functions? 

47. Is there any permanent joint board for adjustment of 

relations between the management and the employees? 
If so, what are the character and functions? 

48. To what extent do you consider the plant thoroughly pro- 

tected by safety devices? 

a. Fire.. 

b. Accident. 

c. Other. 

49. What has been the number of accidents in this plant since 

the installation of scientific management? Describe your 
accident records, 

50. Is any study made of sanitation in the plant? If so, 

what? 

51. Is any study made of occupational diseases, to which em- 

ployees of the plant are subject? If so, what? 

52. Is there a factory nurse? If so, specify duties. Are 

records kept in this connection? If so, what? 

53. Out of his pay envelope, every employee either does or 

does not plan out his living needs. To what extent do 
the workers, or does the plant, or do both provide in 
any way for the following needs of life: 

a. Savings 

b. Illness 

c. Accident 

d. Unemployment 

e. Old age pensions 
/. Life insurance 

g. Purchasing 
h. Housing 

i. Health 

;. Education 
k. Recreation 

54. Is favoritism in the treatment of employees, in this estab- 

lishment, eliminated under scientific management? 
What proofs can you offer? 

55. In the event of disagreenient between a workman and a 



QUESTIONNAIRE 207 

foreman or an assistant foreman, what source of appeal 
has the workman? 

56. Are the workers in this establishment supposed to work 

continuously throughout the day? If not, what periods 
of rest and recreation are allowed the workers of the 
different classes? Are these periods of rest and recrea- 
tion enforced or are they optional with the workers? 

57. If rest and recreation are allowed during the working day : 
a. What forms do they take? 

h. What means are provided by the management? 

58. Are the workers in any classes of work debarred from 

conversation during work? If so, why? 

59. Are the workers in any class of work debarred from 

looking out of windows during work? If so, why? 

60. Are any rules made and enforced in this establishment in 

regard to the retiring of workers during work hours? 
If so, what? 

61. Are the workers in any classes in this establishment free 

to do what work they please, being paid accordingly, 
and free to leave the shop for the day at any time? If 
not, why not? 

62. How do the hours of labor in the classes of work under 

scientific management, in this establishment, compare 
with the hours of labor: 
a. In the classes of work of a substantially' similar nature 

not under scientific management? 
h. In the same classes of work in shops of this region not 
under scientific management? 
6^. Have there been any changes in hours of labor in this 
establishment since scientific management was installed? 
If so, what? 

64. In case of lack of work during a portion of the day due 

to breakdowns, lack of machinery or tools, lack of 

materials or orders: 
a. Is the worker retained in the shop or sent home? 
h. Does he receive pay during the time when there is no 
work? If so, on what basis? 

65. Compare the extent of unavoidable breakdowns and delays 

in the different sections under scientific management 
in this establishment with: 



2o8 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

a. The same sections before scientific management was 

installed. 

b. The non-scientific management sections of the estab- 

lishment. 

66. How does the extent of delays over which the worker 

has no control, due to breakdowns, lack of machinery or 
tools, lack of materials, compare in scientific manage- 
ment shops with non-scientific management shops, judg- 
ing from your experience? 

67. By what process is it assured that the workers in each 

class of work shall have the proper tools and materials 
at the proper time and place : 

a. General statement 

b. Concrete illustration 

How completely are delays and difficulties, occasioned by 
the lack of the above process, eliminated in this shop? 

68. Is the same basic wage established for women as for men 

when the work is identical? 

69. Are women paid at the same rate as men for the same 

kind and degree of efficiency and output? 

70. Should the same basic wage, and the same rates of pay- 

ment, and the same total amounts be paid to women 
as to men when the work is identical, and the same 
kind and degree of efficiency and output exist? If so, 
why? If not, why not? 

71. Where the output of women is greater than the output of 

men, under identical conditions, should the women re- 
ceive a higher rate per unit produced? If not, why not? 
If so, why? 

72. What is the relation of breakage loss to pay roll, in this 

establishment 

a. Under scientific management? 

b. Before scientific management was installed? 

73. How has scientific management, in this establishment, 

affected : 
a. Overtime? 

b. Part time? 

c. Holiday and Sunday work? 

d. Night work? 

e. Vacations? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 209 

74. What is the extent of spoiled or inferior work under 

scientific management, in this estabHshment, as com- 
pared with the situation in the shop before scientific 
management was installed, and as compared with other 
shops of similar nature? 

75. Are there any shop or department committees of em- 

ployees in this establishment? If so, what are their 
nature and functions? 

'j6. Has the shop any workmen's accident committee? 

'j'j. To what extent does scientific management in this estab- 
lishment add to the clerical duties of the workers or 
reduce their clerical duties? 

78. Where these clerical duties are performed by others than 
the workers, is the performance of such clerical duties 
satisfactory or harassing to the workers? 

79 Under functional foremanship, do the workers come into 
more personal contact with the higher management than 
they did before? If so, in what ways specifically does 
this result? 

80. xf a worker has ideas for better methods of doing the 

work, to whom does he make his suggestions? If he 
makes them to a specified person, and that person turns 
the suggestions down, can the worker carry them to 
anyone else without friction? If so, to whom? 

81. Is there any organized machinery in this establishment, 

by which a worker whose soldiering interferes with the 
work of other workers is disciplined by his fellow- 
workers ? 

82. Is there any regular machinery by which a worker can 

formally and officially have his complaint passed on by 
his fellow-workers before he takes it to the manage- 
ment? 

83. Does scientific management, in this establishment, tend to 

make workers more or less interested in each other's 
work than under other forms of management? State 
the grounds for your answer. 

84. Do you believe that scientific management, in this estab- 

lishment, insures just treatment of the individual 
worker ? 
a. What grounds have you for this belief? 



210 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experience 
of this establishment? 

85. Do you regard the interests of the, employers and workers 

as identical? If so, in respect to what matters? 

86. Has the development of scientific management in theory 

and practice been due primarily to the direct experience 
of employers or to the studies and practice ol indus- 
trial engineers? State the grounds for your conclusion. 



SCHEDULE II 

i 

Time and Motion Study 

1. Are any uses made in this establishment of elementary 

time and motion study, or of the results and records of 
such studies? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, what are these uses, specifically stated? Enu- 

merate the specific ways in which time and motion 
studies affect the work and dealings in this establish- 
ment, and benefit it and its employees. 

2. Have the wage-workers of this establishment any voice 

in these matters? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, what, and how is it expressed? 

3. Have elementary time and motion studies been made in 

this establishment? 
o. If not, why not? 
b. If so, 

1. To what extent? 

2. Is it intended to continue making such studies? 

4. For what specific purposes are time and motion studies 

made in this establishment? 

5. Just what is the process of making time and motion studies 

in this plant, and what are the specific conditions imder 

which they are made? 
a. General description. 
'&. Concrete examples. 



QUESTIONNAIRE 211 

6. Have the wage-workers of this establishment any voice 

in this matter? 
a. If not, why not? 
h. If so, what and how is it expressed? 

7. What are the specific items recorded in making time and 

motion studies, and in what form are the records of 

such studies kept? 
a. General description. 
h. Concrete illustrations. 

8. In making time and motion studies in this plant, how many 

men are employed on each study and what are their 
functions ? 

9. By whose authority, and by whom are the time and mo- 

tion study men employed and paid in this establish- 
ment ? 

10. Have the workers of this establishment any voice in this 

matter ? 
o. If not, why not? 
h. If so, what and how is it expressed? 

11. What qualifications are demanded of the time and motion 

study men employed in this establishment? 

12. Have the wage-workers of this establishment any voice in 

this matter? 
o. If not, why not? 
h. If so, what and how is it expressed? 

13. Who are the time and motion study men who have been 

employed in this establishment and what are the records 
of each, training, experience, etc.? 

14. Are the time and motion studies in this establishment 

made openly or secretly? 

15. Is the stop-watch used in making these studies? Has the 

concealed stop-watch ever been used? 

16. Are the time and motion studies in this establishment 

made in the presence of the workers in the shop? 

17. How are the men selected in this establishment upon whom 

time and motion studies are made? 
a. Method. 

h. Is any compulsion used in this connection? 
c. Have the workers themselves any choice in this matter? 
If so, what and how is it exercised? 



212 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

i8. Do the men on whom time and motion studies are made 
in this establishment receive any extra remuneration, or 
reward, or gift, bonus or privilege? 

19. What instructions are given to the men timed in respect 

to their work under test? How are they asked and 
expected to work? 

20. Are the purposes of time and motion studies carefully 

explained to the men beforehand? 

a. To the particular men timed? 

b. To the body of men in the group or shop? 

21. Have the workers of this establishment made any objec- 

tions at any time to the making of these time and mo- 
tion studies, to the methods employed, to the use of the 
stop-watch ? 

a. If so, what? 

b. If so, how have these objections been brought to the 

attention of the management? How have they been 
considered, and with what result ? 

22. Have any workers left this establishment because of the 

introduction of the use of time and motion studies ? 
a. If so, how many and under what circumstances? 

23. Has the attitude of the workers in this establishment 

changed towards time and motion studies? 
a. If so, how and why? 

24. How does timing affect the worker under test? 

a. Nervously and physically, why? 

b. As to speed and quality of work, why? 

25. Do you regard time studies as essential in securing an 

even flow of production through the shop? Can sched- 
ules be maintained without time studies, or can routing 
of material be maintained without time study? 

26. Do elementary time and motion study promote the train- 

ing of the workers? If so, how? 

27. Are elementary time and motion study essential or neces- 

sary to the process of mutual adaptation of the worker 
to the work? 

28. Are elementary time and motion study necessary to the 

standardization of performance? If so, why? 

29. Are elementary time and motion study necessary for the 

elimination of systematic soldiering? If so, why? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 213 

30. Do elementary time and motion study eliminate the chief 

causes of speeding up? If so, how? 

31. Do elementary time and motion study make possible the 

substitution of piece work, or task work, and the piece 
rate, bonus, differential piece rate and premium systems 
of payment where before day work existed or was only 
possible ? 

o. If not, why not? 

b. If so, 

1. Why? 

2. In what classes of work, and to what extent? 

32. Have elementary time and motion study actually resulted 

in the substitution of such modes of work and payment 
in this establishment ? If so, 

a. In what classes of work? 

b. To what extent? 

33. Are elementary time and motion study necessary in order 

that the workers should be furnished with the proper 
tools and materials at the proper time and place? 

a. If so, why? 

34. Do elementary time and motion study in this establish- 

ment actually result in the furnishing to the workers of 
the proper tools and materials at the proper time and 
place? Are they actually so effective? 
o. If not, why not? 

b. If so, to what extent? 

35. Are elementary time and motion study necessary in 

order to substitute exact knowledge for guesswork in- 
the payment of wages? If so, why? 

36. To what extent do elementary time and motion study in 

this establishment substitute exact knowledge for guess- 
work in the payment of wages? 

37. Are elementary time and motion study necessary to secure 

justice to the worker and as between worker and worker 
payment exactly in proportion to efficiency? If so, 
why? 

38. To what extent do elementary time and motion study 

actually secure justice to the worker as between worker 
and worker, and secure payment in proportion to effi- 
ciency? Are they actually so effective? 



214 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, to what extent? 

39. Are elementary time and motion study necessary to secure 

reasonable or highest efficiency on the part of the 

workers ? 
o. If so, why? 

b. If so, in what classes of work and for what kinds of 
workers, and why? 

40. Are elementary time and motion study necessary in order 

to secure exact cost prediction for each kind of product 
turned out? If so, why? 

41. To what extent do elementary time and motion study actu- 

ally make possible such accurate cost prediction in this 
establishment? Are they actually so effective? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, to what extent? 

42. To what extent do elementary time and motion study make 

possible accurate cost accounting? Are they actually 
so effective? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, to what extent? 

43. Are elementary time and motion study necessary to elim- 

inate ignorant bidding on orders, and the selling price 
of shop products? If so, why? 

44. To what extent do they thus eliminate ignorant bidding? 

Are they actually so effective? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, to what extent? 

45. Are elementary time and motion study necessary to elim- 

inate the arbitrary cutting of the wage rates, and the 
arbitrary alteration of the tasks? If so, why? 

46. To what extent do elementary time and motion study 

actually prevent the arbitrary alteration of the tasks, 
and the cutting of the wage rates in this establishment? 
Are they actually effective in this respect? 

a. If not, why not? 

If. If so, to what extent? 

47. Are there any reasons why time and motion study results 

should not be made public? 
«. If not, why not? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 215 

b. If so, why? 

48. Have the results of time and motion study made in this 

establishment been made public? 

49. What is the theory or philosophy of time and motion 

study ? 

50. To what extent does judgment enter into the making 

of time and motion studies and the recording of the 
results which are to be used as task or work standards? 
To what extent are the process and result actually a 
matter of judgment rather than a matter of exact scien- 
tific demonstration? 



SCHEDULE III 

Task Setting 

In the following analysis, questions i to 8 refer to the task 
viewed from the standpoint of the character and scope of the 
operation or operations involved, i. e., how big a section of the 
manufacturing process is included in the standard task. The 
remaining questions refer to the task viewed from the stand- 
point of the amount of work or amount of accomplishment 
required in a given time, or the amount of time allowed for 
doing the standard task unit once. 

1. In the case of task setting, how are the nature of the task 

and of the task unit determined : 

a. Is the existing or established division of work into 

separate operations or the existing division of labor 
used as the guide ? 

b. Is the process of manufacture, considered as a whole, 

subjected to re-analysis, and a new set of operations 
and division of labor established? 

2. In the determination of the actual task unit, is the attempt 

made to further subdivide, or to combine previous unit 
operations ? 

3. In the determination of the actual task thus, does the unit 

of operation represent more or less specialization than 
under the old situation? 



2i6 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

4. In the determination of the character of the task thus, 

what is the ideal or end aimed at by the management, 
i. e., what is the conception of the proper nature of the 
task? What should constitute a task? 

5. Where the process of manufacture is re-analyzed for the 

purpose of determining the character of the task, does 
this analysis involve time and motion study? 

a. If not, what is the actual process of analysis, and of 

the determination of the nature of the task unit? 

b. If so, just what part do time and motion study play 

in this re-analysis, and in the determination of the 
nature of the task? How do they assist in this work? 

1. General statement. 

2. Concrete illustration. 

6. Have the workers objected to the nature of the tasks thus 

set? If so, on what grounds, and how? Is any ma- 
chinery or process provided for the presentation of such 
objections? 

7. In case of objections by the workers to the nature of the 

tasks, are these objections considered by the manage- 
ment? If so, by whom and how? Is any machinery or 
process provided for such consideration? 

8. What has been the result or effect of such objections? 

9. In setting the standard time allowed for the doing of the 

task, what is the ideal sought, i. e., what is the concep- 
tion, on the part of the management, of the proper 
standard time allowance for the task? 

10. Are time and motion study used in setting the standard 

time allowed for doing the standard task? 

11. If not, just how is the standard task time determined 

or set? 

12. Where time and motion study are used, after the charac- 

ter of the task is determined, just what is the actual 
process of fixing the standard time allowed for the task ? 

a. General description 

Jj. Concrete illustration 

13. How do the tasks in your establishment compare with 

those in the same classes of work before scientific man- 
agement was installed? 

14. Is it the purpose in your establishment to increase the 



QUESTIONNAIRE 217' 

extent of the tasks as improvements in machinery, tools, 
materials and methods are made? If so, what is the 
rule as to the increase of tasks under such circumstances ? 

15. Is it the purpose in your establishment to increase the 

extent of the task as the ability of the worker increases ? 
If so, what is the rule as to the increase of tasks under 
such circumstances ? 

16. In setting the time allowed or extent of the task thus, is 

the task timed as a whole, or is it analyzed into its ele- 
mentary motions, and time study made of each, the total 
time being a summation of these elementary times ? 

17. In setting the task thus, is a time study actually made 

of each task in the shop so set, or is the extent of the 
task or the time allowed for it determined by a sum- 
mation of elementary time studies previously made or 
elsewhere made? 

18. In setting the task thus by means of time (and motion) 

study : 

a. How many individual workers are timed on the task 
or its elements before the task is set? Who deter- 
mines this? Have the workers any voice? If so, 
what? 

&. How many time studies are made on each individual 
worker timed before the task is set? Who deter- 
mines this? Have the workers any voice? If so, 
what? 

C. How are the individual workers, who are timed on the 
particular task, selected? 

1. Are they the fastest men; average men; slow 

men; or representatives of different speed 
classes? If so, what classes, and in what pro- 
portions ? 

2. Who determines which men shall be thus timed? 

3. Do the individuals timed have any choice or dis- 

cretion in this matter? If so, what? 

4. Do the workers, as a group, have any choice 

or discretion in this matter? If so, what, and 
how is it exercised? 
d. Have the workers individually, or as a body, any voice 
or discretion in the determination of the extent of 



2i8 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

the task or the time allowed for it? If sc, how is 

this voice or discretion exercised? 
e. Would it be possible to have two time study men or 

task setters in the shop, acting jointly, one appointed 

and paid by the management, and one by the workers ? 

If not, why not? 
/. Would it be possible or practicable to have the time 

study men or time setters jointly appointed and paid 

by the management and the workers? If not, why 

not? 

19. Where time studies for the setting of a particular task 

are made on several individuals, or where several studies 
are made on one individual, what time is taken as stand- 
ard by which to set the task (the shortest time, the 
times averaged, the modal time, or what) ? Why is it 
adopted ? 

20. In setting the task thus by means of time (and motion) 

study, is any allowance made for the "human factor," 
over and above the elementary times sum or the elapsed 
test time? 

21. If so, just how is the allowance determined? 

a. General statement. 

b. Concrete illustration. 

22. In the setting of the task thus by means of time (and 

motion) study, is any allowance made for breakdowns 
and delays over which the worker has no control? 

23. If so, just how is this allowance determined? 
o. General statement 

h. Concrete illustration 

24. In the setting of the task thus by means of time (and 

motion) study: 
a. Are any special physiological or psychological studies 
made of the workers timed with reference to the 
immediate effect upon them in the way of exhaustion 
or nervous strain or with reference to the long- 
time effects of the work at the speed attained? 

1. Any studies of fatigue? If so, what? 

2. Any special psychological tests? If so, what? 

3. Any special physiological tests? If so, what? 
h. Just how is it determined that the task set will not 



QUESTIONNAIRE 219 

be injurious to them immediately or in the long 
run? 

25. In setting the task thus by means of time (and motion) 

study : 
a. Are any special physiological or psychological studies 
made of the workers not timed, the general body of 
workers in the shop who are to perform the work, 
with reference to their ability to perform the task 
set without nervous strain, exhaustion or long-time 
evil results: 

1. Any studies of fatigue? If so, what, and to 

what extent numerically? 

2. Any special physiological studies? If so, what, 

and to what extent numerically? 

3. Any special psychological studies? If so, what, 

and to what extent? 

26. Have the workers objected to the amount or extent of 

the tasks thus set? If so, on what grounds, and how? 
Is any machinery or process provided for the voicing 
of such objections? 

27. In case of objections by the workers to the amount and 

extent of the tasks, are these objections considered by 
the management? If so, by whom and how? Is any 
machinery or process provided for such consideration? 

28. What has been the result or effect of such objections ? 

29. Is the making of the task and bonus in your establishment 

entirely voluntary on the part of the workers? What 
happens to the worker who does not pretty consistently 
make the task? 

30. What number and proportion of workers who have been 

tried out on the tasks in the different classes of work 
in this establishment failed ultimately to make the 
task 

a. Altogether? 

b. One-third of the time? 

c. One-half of the time? 

d. Three- fourths of the time? 

31. Is task setting necessary to secure reasonable or the 

highest efficiency? If so, for what classes of work and 
for what kinds of workers and why? 



220 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

32. What is there under scientific management that prevents 

unfair distribution of work? 

33. Does scientific task setting promote the training of the 

workers? If so, how? 

34. How does scientific management insure that the task is 

set with due relation between quantity and quaHty, i. e., 
so as to insure no falling off in quality? 

35. In the setting of a task, just how is it proved to be right 

or wrong? 
a. Just what are the basis and terms of the proof? 
h. Just what is the process of proof? 

36. Does observation disclose that the tasks in the scientific 

management sections of this establishment are generally 
or in particular cases specialized: 
a. More or less than in the non-scientific management 

sections where the work is of a similar nature? 
h. More or less than in non-scientific management shops 
where the work is of a similar nature? 

37. Does observation disclose that the workers in this estab- 

lishment operating under the task system are generally, 
or in any particular cases: 
a. More or less speeded up than the workers in the non- 
scientific management sections where work is of a 
similar nature? 
h. More or less speeded up than the workers in non- 
scientific management shops of a similar nature? 
c. More or less speeded up than the workers operating 
under other systems of work? 

38. Does observation disclose any overspeeded, overfatigued 

or exhausted workers operating under the task system 
in this establishment? 

39. To what extent is the increased efficiency of this estab- 

lishment under scientific management secured without 
any added exertion on the part of the workers, e. g., 
to what extent is any speeding-up under scientific 
management a speeding-up of machinery solely? 
a. Give concrete illustration 



QUESTIONNAIRE 221 

SCHEDULE III-A 
Standardization of Efficiency 

In the following analysis, questions i to 8 refer to the char- 
acter and scope of the operation or operations involved in the 
"unit of work," i. e., how big a section of the planning, sched- 
uling and dispatching process is included in the standard "work" 
unit? 

Questions 9 to 38 refer to amount of work or accomplish- 
ment required to attain a given degree of efificiency or a per- 
centage of efficiency, or the amount of time allowed for accom- 
plishing the "unit of work" with a given percentage of effi- 
ciency. 

1. In the case of efficiency gradation, how is the nature and 

scope of the "unit of work" determined? 

a. Is the existing or established division of work into 

separate operations or the existing division of labor 
used as the guide? 

b. Is the process of planning, scheduling and dispatching 

considered as a whole, or subjected to re-analysis, 
and a new set of operations, and division of labor 
used? 

2. In the determination of the "unit of work," is the attempt 

made to further subdivide or to combine previous unit 
operations ? 

3. In the determination of the method of work thus, does 

the unit of operation represent more or less specializa- 
tion than under the old situation? 

4. In the determination of the character of the "unit of work" 

thus, what is the ideal or end aimed at on the part of 
the manager, what is his conception of the proper nature 
of the work unit? 

5. Where the processes of planning, scheduling and dis- 

patching are re-analyzed for the purpose of determining 
the character of the work unit, does this re-analysis 
involve time and motion study? 
a. If not, what is the actual process of analysis, and of 
the determination of the nature of the work unit ? 



222 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

b. If so, just what part do time and motion study play in 
re-analysis, and in the determination of the nature of 
the work unit? How do they assist in this? 

1. General statement 

2. Concrete illustration 

6. Have the workers objected to the nature of the work units 

thus set? If so, on what grounds and how? Is any 
machinery or process provided for the presentation of 
such objections? 

7. In the case of objections by the workers to the nature of 

the work units, are these objections considered by the 
management? If so, by whom and how? Is any ma- 
chinery or process provided for their consideration? 

8. What has been the result or effect of such objections? 

9. In determining the scale of efficiency, or the time allowed 

for doing each unit of work, with a given efficiency per- 
centage, what is the ideal sought, i. e., what is the con- 
ception on the part of the management of the proper- 
efficiency scale for the work unit; or, to put it in other 
words, what represents normal efficiency, or 100 per 
cent? 

10. Is it possible to establish a just scale of efficiency for each 

class of work? If so, how is the justice of the scale 
to be arrived at or determined? What is the proof of 
its justice? 

11. What factors are considered in each case in determining 

the efficiency, i. e., what shall be regarded as 100 per 
cent, efficiency, 50 per cent, efficiency; just how is the 
efficiency scale arrived at in each case? 

12. Are time and motion study used in establishing the scale 

of efficiency in connection with the performance of the 
"work unit"? 

13. If not, just how is the scale of efficiency determined? 

14. Where time and motion study are used, after the character 

of the "unit of work" is determined, just what is the 
process of determining the scale of efficiency in connec- 
tion with the performance of work? 

a. General description 

b. Concrete illustration 

15. In determining the scale of efficiency thus, is the *'unit 



QUESTIONNAIRE 223 

o£ work" considered as a whole, or is it analyzed into 
its elementary motions, and time study made on each, 
the total time representing a given percentage of effi- 
ciency being a summation of these elementary times? 

16. How do the efficiency scales in your establishment com- 

pare with, the same classes of work before scientific 
management was installed? 

17. Is it the purpose in your establishment to change the 

efficiency scales as improvements in machinery, tools, 
materials and methods are made? If so, what is the 
rule governing such changes? 

18. Is it the purpose in your establishment to change the 

efficiency scales as the ability of the workers changes? 
If so, what is the rule governing such change? 

19. In determining the efficiency scale thus, is a time study 

made of each unit of work actually to be performed, 
or is the scale of efficiency determined by a summation 
of the elementary time studies previously made or else- 
where made? 

20. In the determination of the efficiency scale thus by means 

of time and motion study 

a. How many individual workers are timed on the work 

unit or these elements before the efficiency scale is 
set? 

1. Who determines this? 

2. Have the workers any voice? If so, how? 

b. How many time studies are made on each individual 

worker timed before the efficiency scale is set? 

1. Who determines this? 

2. Have the workers any voice? If so, how? 

c. How are the individual workers who are timed on the 

particular work unit selected? 

1. Are they the fastest men, average men, or slow 

men, or representatives of different speed 
classes? If so, what classes, and in what pro- 
portions ? 

2. Who determines which men shall be thus timed? 

3. Do the individuals timed have any voice or dis- 

cretion in this matter? If so, what, and how 
is it expressed? 



224 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

4. Do the workers, as a group, have any voice in 
this matter? If so, what, and how is it ex- 
pressed and exercised ? 

d. Have the workers individually or as a body any voice 

or discretion in the determination of the scale of 
efficiency? If so, how is this voice or discretion 
exercised ? 

e. Would it be possible or practicable to have two men 

to determine the scale of efficiency, one appointed 
by the management and one by the workers? If not, 
why not? 

f. Would it be possible or practicable to have the time 

study man or men who determine the scale of effi- 
ciency jointly appointed and paid by the management 
and the workers? If not, why not? 

21. Where time studies for the determination of the scale of 

efficiency are made on several individuals, or where 
several studies are made on one individual, which re- 
sult is taken as the standard by which to determine the 
efficiency scale, the shortest time, the time averaged, the 
modal time, or what? 

22. In determining the scale of efficiency thus, by means of 

time and motion study, is any allowance made for the 
"human factor" over and above the elementary times 
sum, or the elapsed test time? 

23. If so, just how is this allowance determined? 

a. General statement. 

b. Concrete illustration. 

24. In determining the efficiency scale thus by means of time 

and motion study, is any allowance made for break- 
downs and delays over which the worker has no con- 
trol? 

25. If so, just how is this allowance determined? 

a. General statement. 

b. Concrete illustration. 

26. In determining the scale of efficiency thus, by means of 

time and motion study, 
a. Are any special physiological or psychological studies 
made of the workers timed with reference to the 
immediate effect upon them in the way of exhaustion 



QUESTIONNAIRE 225 

or nervous strain, or with reference to the long-time 
effects of the work at the speed attained? 

1. Any studies of fatigue? If so, what? 

2. Any special psychological tests? If so, what? 

3. Any special physiological tests? If so, what? 
b. Just how is it determined that the scale of efficiency 

established will not be injurious to them immediately 
or in the long run? 

27. In determining the scale of efficiency by means of time 

and motion study 
a. Are any special physiological or psychological studies 
made of the workers not timed, the general body of 
workers who are to do the work, with reference 
to their ability to attain standard efficiency without 
nervous strain, exhaustion, or any other evil results? 

1. Any studies of fatigue? If so, what and to 

what extent numerically? 

2. Any special psychological studies? If so, what 

and to what extent numerically? 

3. Any special physiological studies? If so, what 

and to what extent numerically? 

28. Have the workers objected to the efficiency scale thus 

set? If so, on what grounds, and how? Is any ma- 
chinery provided for the voicing of these objections? 

29. In case of objections by the workers to the scale of 

efficiency, are these objections considered by the man- 
agement? If so, by whom, and how ? Is any machinery 
or process provided for their consideration? 

30. What has been the result of the effect of such objections? 

31. Is the making of an efficiency percentage sufficient to 

secure a premium payment in your establishment en- 
tirely voluntary on the part of the worker? What hap- 
pens to the worker who does not pretty consistently 
attain this degree of efficiency? 

32. What number and proportion of the workers who have 

been tried out on the different classes of work in this 
establishment failed to make the percentage of efficiency 
necessary to receive a premium payment? 

a. Altogether 

b. One-third of the time 



226 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

c. One-half of the time 

d. Three-fourths of the time 

33. Does standardization of efficiency promote the training of 

the workers? If so, how? 

34. How does scientific management insure that the efficiency 

scale is related to the scale of premium payments so 
that there will not be a tendency on the part of the 
workers to neglect quality for quantity? 

35. Does observation disclose that the "unit of work" in the 

scientific management section of such establishments is 
generally or in particular cases specialized? 
a. More or less than in the non-scientific management 

sections where work is of a similar nature? 
h. More or less than in the non-scientific management 
shops where work is of a similar nature? 

36. Does observation disclose that the workers in these estab- 

lishments, operating under the scale of efficiency set, are 
generally or in particular cases 

a. More or less speeded up than the workers in the non- 
scientific management sections, where work is of a 
similar nature? 

h. More or less speeded up than in non-scientific manage- 
ment establishments, where work is of a similar 
nature ? 

c. More or less speeded up than workers operating under 
other systems of work? 

37. Does observation disclose any overspeeded, overfatigued 

or exhausted workers, operating under the efficiency 
scale in this establishment? 

38. To what extent is the increased efficiency in this estab- 

lishment under scientific management secured without 
any added exertion on the part of the workers, e. g., 
to what extent is any speeding up under scientific man- 
agement a speeding-up of machinery solely? Give con- 
crete illustration. 



QUESTIONNAIRE 227 

SCHEDULE IV 

Wages 

1. What is your general theory of wages? 

2. In how many departments, affecting how many workers, 

does the management now fix wages by treating with 
the individual employees? 

3. What are the main reasons because of which the manage- 

ment believes in individual bargaining? 

4. To what extent has this establishment made use of col- 

lective bargaining in determining basic or other wage 
rates, i. e., what classes of work and how many indi- 
viduals have had their wages determined by such col- 
lective bargaining: 

a. Before the introduction of scientific management? 

h. Since the introduction of scientific management? 

c. What will be the probable tendency in the future? 

5. To what extent has the management made wage agree- 

ments with the unions: 
a. If at all, why? 
&. If not, why not? 

6. When scientific management was installed in this estab- 

lishment, were the base wage, the wages or the wage 
rates (not earnings) on any classes of work lowered? 

a. If so, to what extent and why? 

h. How many workers were affected? 

7. When scientific management was installed in this estab- 

lishment, were the base wage, the wages or the wage 

rates on any classes of work raised? 
a. If so, why and to what extent? 
h. How many workers were affected? 

8. What actual base wages have you paid the different classes 

of workers in this establishment since scientific man- 
agement was installed? 

9. How do these base wages compare with those of the same 

classes of workers in the region, not under scientific 
management? With the trade union wage standards of 
the region, for the same classes of workers? 



228 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

10. In those departments of this establishment under scientific 

management, what is the present average daily wage 
of all employees as compared with the average wage 
for the same group before the introduction of the new 
system ? 

11. How do the average earnings of the workers, as a whole, 

in this establishment, under scientific management, com- 
pare with the average wages or earnings of the same 
classes of workers 

a. In non-scientific management shops of this region? 

b. Demanded by the union scales? 

12. What have been the average earnings, in this establish- 

ment, of the workers in the different classes of work 
under each of the systems of payment in use, during 
the past year? 

13. What are the relative wages or earnings of the skilled, 

unskilled and semi-skilled workers in the scientific man- 
agement portions of this establishment as compared with 
the relative wages or earnings of skilled, unskilled and 
semi-skilled workers 

a. In the same sections of the establishment before scien- 

tific management was installed? 

b. In the non-scientific management sections of this estab- 

lishment ? 

c. In non-scientific management shops of this region? 

d. The union scale? 

14. How is it possible to decide that different kinds of work 

and different classes of workers should be paid at dif- 
ferent rates with respect to base wage, piece or bonus 
rates, premium rates, etc., and what the actual differ- 
ences should be in order that each class should be paid 
in proportion to efficiency? What is the process by 
which these differences are actually determined in this 
establishment ? 

15. Does scientific management make standards of wages 

more or less flexible ? 

16. In determining bonuses and premiums does the manage- 

ment at first install the premiums and bonuses which 
they believe will be final, or do they introduce a lower 
scale (allowing for possible error in calculations as to 



QUESTIONNAIRE 229 

what they can afford) and eventually raise those 
bonuses ? 

17. To what degree are the primary determinations of wage 

rates found to bear the test of experience ? 

18. Workers often object to the introduction of piece rates 

because they fear an eventual lowering of the rate. 
Has this establishment found that they bring the same 
objection against other advanced payment systems? 

19. How does the management demonstrate to them that real 

scientific management is in itself a guarantee against 
rate cutting? 

20. Would your present shop efficiency be possible under 

any other form of management, such as a cooperating 
scheme ? 

21. Could any such scheme be as efficient without piece rates 

and the premium and bonus systems? 

22. Will day work and day wage ever secure reasonable or 

the highest efficiency? If so, under what circumstances? 

23. Does scientific management mean ultimately the complete 

elimination of day work and day wage? 
a. If so, why? 
h. If not, where are day work and day wage scheduled 

for permanent retention? Under what conditions 

and for what kinds of work? 

24. Are the wage-workers in this establishment paid exactly 

what they are worth, in each case, or in exact propor- 
tion to their efficiency? 

o. If not, why not? 

h. If so, just how is the exact worth or efficiency of the 
worker determined? What is the proof? 

25. What is meant when it is said that scientific management 

pays men rather than positions? 

26. If scientific management pays men rather than positions, 

what kind of progress in the man does it pay? 

27. Is payment based entirely on quantity and quality of 

production, or is it considered good business to pay 
men still higher wages regardless of production, when 
they 

a. Show thought and ambition? 

h. When they exhibit a sense of personal achievement? 



230 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

c. When they show interest, joy and zest in their work? 

d. When they exhibit signs of inventive genius? 

e. When they are seen to be energized intellectually? 

/. When it is clear that they are growing in self-reliance, 
self-respect, individuality, personality and dignity? 

28. How long have the present wage rates been operative ? 

29. Are all the wage rates now so carefully determined that 

the management feels them to be the most economical 
possible ? 
a. If not most economical, why? 

30. When it is necessary temporarily to put a higher rate 

worker on a lower rate job, have you any method of 
securing for him his regular or higher rate while thus 
working, e. g., a retainer? 

31. Do lower local costs, taxes, rents, subsistence, etc., justify 

local wage rates, proportionately low? 

32. Would increase in the cost of living constitute an effec- 

tive reason for the advancement of the base wage? 

33. Has the base wage ever been increased on this account? 

34. How are wages in this establishment affected by general 

wage rates which alter concurrently with industrial de- 
pressions and booms? 



SCHEDULE IV-A 
The Differential Piece-Rate System 

1. When and by whom was the differential piece-rate system 

installed in this establishment? What system or systems 
of work and pay did it displace? 

2. For what classes of work is it employed, and what are 

the numbers, proportions and sex of the workers in this 
establishment operating under it? 

3. What were the considerations which led to its adoption, 

and why was it adopted ? 

4. By whose authority was it introduced? 

5. Did the workers have any voice in determining whether 

it should be introduced or not? If so, what? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 231 

Did the workers or any of them object to its introduction? 
If so, 

a. What class or classes of workers? 

b. To what extent? 

c. On what grounds, or from what causes? 

d. Were the objections of the workers considered? If so, 

in what manner? 
Is it, in general, desirable or practicable for the workers 
to have any voice in determining whether or not the 
differential piece rate shall be introduced, or, after it is 
introduced, whether or not it shall be retained? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, 

1. Which workers should have such a voice? 

2. How should the workers' choice be expressed? 

3. What consideration should be given to the work- 

ers' preference? 

4. How and by whom should a decision be reached ? 

5. Should trade unions or trade union officials be 

allowed any voice in this matter? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, what? 

Is a basic or day wage established in connection with the 
differential piece-rate system in this establishment, which 
is paid the workers who fail to make the task? 

o. If not, why not? 

b. If so, on what basis is it calculated? 

c. If so, 

1. How, and by whom, and on what grounds was 

this day wage fixed for each class of work and 
workers ? 

2. Did the workers have any voice in this matter? 

If so, what? 

3. Would it be desirable or practicable for the 

workers to have a voice in this matter? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, why, and how should it be ex- 

pressed ? 

4. Would it be desirable or practicable to accept, 

as the basic or day wage in this connection, 



.232 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

the standard rate or wage established by trade 
unions for the class of work in question? If 
not, why not? 

5. Is it desirable or practicable to change the day 

rate after it has once been established in con- 
nection with the differential piece-rate system? 

a. If not, why not ? 

b. If so, should the workers have any voice 

in this matter, and if any, what and hew 
should it be expressed? 

6. Has the basic or day wage been changed or 

altered in any case in this establishment since 
the differential piece-rate system was intro- 
duced? If so, how, by whom, and to what 
extent ? 

7. What considerations and circumstances might 

justify the changing of the base or day wage; 
would industrial depression, and a fall in gen- 
eral wages constitute a justification? 
9. By whom, and how, or on what grounds are the differential 
piece rates to be paid for each task determined? 

10. Have the workers any voice in this matter? 
a. If not, why not? 

h. If so, how is it expressed, and what consideration is 
given to it? 

11. What are the actual differential piece rates on the different 

classes of work under this system, paid in this estab- 
lishment ? 

12. What considerations determine the fixing of the actual 

differential piece rates, and the amount of difference 
between them in each case or class of work and work- 
ers? Just what factors are considered? Just how is 
the actual rate in each case determined? 

13. Just how are the differential piece rates calculated? 

a. General statement. 

b. Concrete illustration. 

14. Are the differential piece rates calculated by the hour, 

the day, or for some longer period? 
a. If so, what? 
h. On what grounds is this period of calculation fixed? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 233 

15. Is it possible to establish just differential piece rates for 

each class of work? If so, how are just rates to be ar- 
rived at or determined? What is the proof of their 
justice ? 

16. What entitles a worker to the higher differential piece rate 

or rates? What factors are considered? What facts 
and conditions demanded? 

17. What deprives a worker of the higher differential piece 

rate or rates? What factors are considered? What 
facts and conditions determine? 

18. Does the employer derive an advantage under the differ- 

ential piece-rate system, when the worker almost but 

does not quite make the task? 
a. If so, what? 
h. If not, why not? 

19. Who determines whether or not the higher differential 

piece rates shall be awarded? 

20. Have the workers any voice in this matter? If so, how 

is it expressed ? What consideration is given to it ? 

21. When the differential piece rates for a task have been 

once fixed, are they ever changed or cut, raised or low- 
ered? 
a. If not, why not? 

h. If so, by whose authority, why, and on what grounds? 
c. Have the workers any voice m this matter? If so, what 
workers, and how is their opinion expressed? Are 
they consulted? 

22. To what extent, if any, have the differential piece rates 

actually been changed in this establishment after having 
been once fixed, and for what reasons? 

23. What considerations might justify the changing of the 

differential piece rates? 

24. When the differential piece-rate system was introduced, 

was there any conscious effort to secure a select class 
of workers? 

25. If so, by what process were the new workers selected, 

and the old workers eliminated? What considerations 
governed ? What tests were made ? 

26. Do the workers now under the differential piece-rate sys- 

tem represent a select class of higher quality as respects 



234 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

sex, age, initial health, initial training, and ability su- 
perior to the old workers at the same work? 
2.^. Since the differential piece rates were introduced in the 
establishment, what proportion of applicants for work 
have been hired? How does this compare with the 
situation before the differential piece rate was intro- 
duced ? 

28. Since the differential piece rate was introduced in this 

establishment what number and proportion of newly 
hired workers have failed to make good? 

29. When the differential piece-rate system was introduced in 

each class of work in this establishment: 
a. What number and proportion of the workers who had 
been doing the work were rejected or dropped out of 
their particular work immediately, and for what rea- 
sons? 
&. What number and proportion were rejected or dropped 
out of their work within 

1. One month, and for what reasons? 

2. Three months, and for what reasons? 

3. One year, and for what reasons? 

c. What number and proportion of the workers who re- 

mained in the particular work, in each case habitu- 
ally attained the task and received the higher differ- 
ential rates? ' 

1. Immediately. 

2. Within three weeks. 

3. Within three months. 

4. Within six months. 

5. Within one year. 

6. Finally. 

d. How long, on the average, did it take the workers who 

remained in each class of work to reach the point 
where they habitually made the task and received the 
higher differential piece rates? 

e. What number and proportion of the workers in each 

class of work exceeded the task necessary to receive 
the higher differential piece rates? 

1. Within three weeks. 

2. Within three months. 



QUESTIONNAIRE 235 

3. Within six months. 

4. Within one year. 

/, Did these workers who exceeded the task receive a still 
higher differential piece rate? 

g. What number and proportion of the workers who re- 
mained at the particular work in each class habitually 
exceeded the task necessary to receive the higher dif- 
ferential piece rates? 

30. What proportion of the workers in each case or class of 

work fall to a lower standard after having attained the 
task habitually, and so lose the higher differential piece 
rate? 

31. What became of the workers who were rejected or dropped 

out when the differential piece-rate system was intro- 
duced, and during its operation? 

a. Were efforts made to retain them? If so, what? 

b. To what extent were they given work elsewhere in the 

establishment ? 

c. How did the wages of those given work elsewhere in 

the establishment compare with their former wages? 

d. What became of those who were not retained in this 

establishment ? 
•22. What was the average number of workers in each case 
or class of work after the differential piece-rate system 
was introduced as compared with the number previously 
so employed? 

a. During the six months preceding the introduction of the 

differential piece-rate system ? 

b. During the six months succeeding the introduction of 

the differential piece rate system? 

c. At present? 

d. How are these changes to be explained ? 

33. What instruction and assistance are provided for the work- 
ers when and after the differential piece-rate system 
is introduced? 

a. Who are the instructors, and what is their proportion 

to the workers? 

b. How and by whom are these instructors selected? 

c. What are the qualifications required for these instruc- 

tors? 



236 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

d. What are their functions? Are they expected to give 
frequent and minute instructions? 

34. What is the nature of the instruction card used under the 

differential piece-rate system in this establishment? 

a. General description. 

b. Concrete examples or samples. 

35. By what process does the worker secure the instruction 

cards ? 

36. Is the worker ever allowed to depart from the instructions 

on these cards, to invent and use methods of his own? 

37. Is the worker allowed or encouraged to make suggestions 

in regard to instructions and methods? 
a. li not, why not? 
h. If so, how? 

38. What is the degree of punctuality and regularity and con- 

tinuity of the workers under the differential piece-rate 
system, as compared 
a. With the same workers before the differential piece-rate 

system was introduced? 
h. As compared with the workers not under the differen- 
tial piece-rate system? 

39. What is the degree of variation of output, from day to day, 

and week to week, of the individual workers under the 
differential piece-rate system as compared 
a. With the same workers before the differential piece- 
rate system was introduced? 
h. As compared with the workers not under the differen- 
tial piece-rate system? 

40. What is the amourit of delay between tasks or jobs during 

the day under the differential piece-rate system, i.e., the 
amount of time when there is no work for the oper- 
ator? 
a. As compared with the situation before the introduction 

of the differential piece-rate system? 
h. As compared with the workers not under the differen- 
tial piece-rate system? 

41. In case there is no work for part of the day on the par- 

ticular task on which the worker is engaged 
a. Is he set at other tasks? 
h. Is he paid for this idle time? If so, on what basis? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 237 

c. Does he lose payment according to the higher differ- 
ential piece rate? 

42. If a basic or day wage is used in connection with the 

differential piece-rate system, what is its amount in each 
class of work? 

43. What were the average and maximum earnings of the 

workers in each class of work before the introduction 
of the differential piece-rate system? 

44. What have been the earnings in each class of work where 

the workers just made the task and no more? 

45. What have been the average maximum earnings in 

each class of work under the differential piece-rate 
system 

a. Within the past six months? 

b. Within any other period? 

46. What have been the average actual earnings in each class 

of work under the differential piece-rate system. 

a. During the past six months ? 

b. Within any other period? 

47. What have been the average actual earnings of the work- 

ers who exceeded the task 

a. Within the past six months? 

b. Within any other period? 

48. Have any workers under the differential piece-rate system 

earned less than the customary wage for the class of 
work in question in this region? 

a. If so, what have been their numbers and proportion in 

each class of work? 

b. What has been the amount of time during which they 

received these lower earnings compared with the time 
of their service? 

c. What has been the policy toward such workers? 

1. Have they been discharged, and, if so, after how 

long a period? 

2. Has any effort been made to place them in other 

lines of work where they could attain the task, 
and, if so, what success has resulted from 
these efforts? 
3. What proportion of them ever succeed in mak- 
ing the task in other lines of work? 



238 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

49. Is any maximum limit put upon the earnings of the work- 

ers under the differential piece-rate system ? 

50. What system of inspection is used in connection with the 

differential piece-rate system? 

51. Has the minuteness of inspection necessary to secure stand- 

ard product increased or decreased since the introduc- 
tion of the differential piece-rate system, and to what 
extent ? 

52. What has been the quality of the work turned out since 

the differential piece-rate system was introduced, as 

compared with 
o. The same work and workers before its introduction? 
b. The sections of this establishment not under the differ- 
ential piece-rate system? 

53. How does the quantity of work turned out where the dif- 

ferential piece-rate system is in vogue compare with that 
in the same sections of this establishment before the dif- 
ferential piece-rate system was introduced? 

54. How has the introduction of the differential piece-rate 

system affected the costs of the product? 

a. The labor cost per unit? 

b. The final cost per unit? 

55. Do the workers under the differential piece-rate system 

show any evidences of Overspeeding, overfatigue, or 
nervous or physical exhaustion? 

56. Have the character, quality, sex "and age of the workers 

changed where the differential piece-rate system haS 
been introduced? If so, how? 

57. What has been the effect of the differential piece-rate 

system upon the spirit of the shop? 

a. Upon the attitude of the workers toward their work? 

b. Upon the attitude of the workers toward the manage- 

ment? 

c. Upon the attitude of the workers toward their fellows 

in the group and the shop? 

58. Are the workers under the differential piece-rate system 

in this establishment generally satisfied with the system ? 

a. If so, why do they like it? 

b. If not, what do they complain of in connection with 

it? • 



QUESTIONNAIRE 239 

59. Do the workers in this estabHshment prefer the differential 

piece-rate system to any other system? 
o. If so, how do they show it? 
b. If not, what system do they prefer and why? 

60. What has been the effect of the introduction of the differ- 

ential piece-rate system upon the attitude of the work- 
ers toward trade unionism? How do they regard it? 

61. Is the differential piece-rate system necessary to secure 

reasonable or the highest efficiency? If so, for what 
classes of work and for what kinds of workers, and why ? 

62. Is the differential piece-rate system necessary in order 

that each worker shall be paid in exact proportion to his 
efficiency? If so, why? 

6^. Does the differential piece-rate system tend to guarantee 
against arbitrary rate cutting, and the arbitrary altera- 
tion of the task? If so, how? 

64. Under the differential piece-rate system, after it has been 
well established, how many less workers does it take 
in the different classes of work on the average to do 
a job or turn out a given amount of product, than for- 
merly, i.e., what are the proportions before and after? 



SCHEDULE IV-B 
The Task and Bonus System 

1. When and by whom was the task an3 bcnuS System in- 

stalled in this establishment? What system or systems 
of work and pay did it displace? 

2. For what classes of work is it employed, afld what are the 

numbers, proportions and sex of the workers in this 
establishment operating under it? 

3. What were the considerations which led to its adoption, 

and why was it adopted? 

4. By whose authority was it introduced ? 

5. Did the workers have any voice in determining whether 

it should be introduced or not? If so, what? 

6. Did the workers or any of them object to its introduction? 

If so. 



240 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

a. What class or classes of workers? 
h. To what extent? 

c. On what grounds, or from what causes? 

d. Were the objections of the workers considered? If 

so, in what manner? 

7. Is it, in general, desirable or practicable for the workers 

to have any voice in determining whether or not the 
task and bonus system shall be introduced, or, after it 
is introduced, whether or not it shall be retained? 

o. If not, why not? 

h. If so, 

1. Which workers should have such a voice? 

2. How should the workers' choice be expressed? 

3. What considerations should be given to the 

workers' preference? 

4. How and by whom should a decision be reached? 

5. Should trade unions or trade union officials be 

allowed any voice in this matter? 
a. If not, why not? 
h. If so, what? 

8. Is a basic or day wage established in connection with the 

task and bonus system in this shop, which is paid the 

workers who fail to make the task? 
o. If not, why not? 
h. If so, on what basis is it calculated? 

9. How, by whom, and on what grounds was this day wage 

fixed or determined, for each class of work and workers ? 

10. Did the workers have any voice in this matter? If so, 

what? 

11. Would it be desirable or practicable for the workers to 

have a voice in this matter? 
a. If not, why not? 
h. If so, how should it be expressed? 

12. Would it be desirable or practicable to accept, as the 

basic or day wage in this connection, the standard rate 
or wage established by trade unions for the class of work 
in question? If not, why not? 

13. Is it desirable or practicable to change the day wage after 

it has been established in connection with the task and 
bonus system? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 241 

o. If not, why not? 

b. If so, should the workers have any voice in this mat- 
ter, and, if any, what, and how should it be expressed ? 

14. Has the basic or day wage been changed or altered in 

any case in this establishment since the task and bonus 
system was introduced? If so, how, and by whom, and 
to what extent? 

15. What considerations and circumstances might justify the 

changing of the base or day wage; would industrial 
depression and a fall in general wages constitute a jus- 
tification ? 

16. By whom, and how, or on what grounds is the rate or 

wage to be paid for each task determined? 

17. Have the workers any voice in this matter, and if so, how 

is it expressed? 

18. When the task rate has been once established or fixed, is 

it ever changed or cut, raised or lowered? 

a. If not, why not ? 

b. If so, by whose authority, why, and on what grounds? 

c. Have the workers any voice in this matter? If so, 

what workers, and how is it expressed? Are they 
consulted ? 

19. To what extent, if any, have the task rates actually been 

changed in this establishment, and for what reasons? 

20. What considerations and circumstances might justify the 

changing of the task rates ? 

21. Where the task has been once fixed, is it ever changed? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, by whose authority, and why, and on what 

grounds ? 

c. Have the workers any voice in the matter? If so, 

what workers, and how is it expressed? Are they 
consulted ? 

22. To what extent, if any, have the tasks actually been 

changed in this establishment after being once fixed? 
How? For what reasons? 

23. What considerations might justify the changing of the 

tasks ? 

24. What is the extent or amount of the bonus allowed for 

each class of work and worker? 



242 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

25. What factors are considered in determining the bonus 

rate in each case; just how is the actual rate in each 
case determined? 

26. Just how is the bonus calculated? 
a. General statement. 

h. Concrete illustration. 

27. Are the bonus payments to be given calculated on the basis 

of the output of the worker for the hour or day, or on 
the basis of a longer period? If so, for what period, 
and why? 

28. Is it possible to establish z just bonus rate for each class 

of work? If so, how is the just rate to be arrived at 
or determined; what is the proof of its justice? 

29. When a worker on a given class or piece of work is found 

to be making the task which will secure the bonus, is 
he ever shifted to another task within the period for 
which the bonus payment is habitually calculated? If 
so, for what reasons? 

30. Is a worker ever placed on a class or piece of work in 

which his efficiency is known or suspected to be less 
than on the work in which he was previously engaged? 
If so, for what reasons? 

31. What entitles a worker to a bonus? 
a. What factors are considered? 

h. What facts and conditions demanded? 

32. What deprives a worker of a bonus? 
a. What factors are considered? 

h. What facts and conditions determine? 

33. Who determines the extent of the bonus, and whether or 

not it shall be awarded? 

34. Have the workers any voice in these matters? 

a. If so, how is it expressed? 
h. If not, why not? 

c. What consideration is given to it? 

35. When the bonus for a task has been once fixed, is it ever 

changed ? 
o. If not, why not? 

b. If so, by whose authority, why, and on what ground is 

it changed? 

c. Have the workers any voice in this matter? If so. 



QUESTIONNAIRE 243 

what workers, and how is it expressed? Are they 
consulted ? 

36. To what extent, if any, have the bonus rates actually been 

changed in this establishment after being once fixed, 
and for what reasons? 

37. What considerations and circumstances might justify the 

changing of the bonus rates? 

38. When the task and bonus system was introduced, was 

there any conscious effort to secure a select class of 
workers ? 

39. If so, by what processes were new workers selected, old 

workers eliminated? What considerations governed? 
What tests were made? 

40. Do the workers now under task and bonus represent a 

select class of higher quality as respects age, sex, ini- 
tial health, initial training and ability superior to the 
old workers doing the same work? 

41. Since the task and bonus was introduced into this estab- 

lishment, what proportion of applicants for work has 
been hired? How does this compare with the situation 
before task and bonus was introduced? Explain. 

42. Since the task and bonus system was introduced into this 

establishment, what number and proportion of workers 
newly hired have failed to make good? 

43. When task and bonus was introduced in each class of 

work in this establishment: 
a. What number and proportion of the workers who had 

been doing the work were rejected or dropped out 

of their particular work immediately, and for what 

reasons? 
h. What number and proportion were rejected or dropped 

out of their work within 

1. One month, and for what reasons? 

2. Three months, and for what reasons? 

3. One year, and for what reasons? 

C. What number and proportion of the workers who re- 
mained in the particular work, in each case, attained 
the task habitually? 

1. Immediately. 

2. Within three weeks. 



244 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

3. Within three months. 

4. Within six months. 

5. Within one year. 

6. Finally. 

d. How long, on the average, did it take the workers who 

remained in each class of work to reach the point 
where they made the task habitually? 

e. What number and proportion of the workers in each 

class of work exceeded the task? 

1. Within three weeks. 

2. Within three months. 

3. Within six months. 

4. Within one year. 

/. What number and proportion of the workers who re- 
mained at the particular work in each class exceeded 
the task habitually? 

1. Within three weeks. 

2. Within three months. 

3. Within six months. 

4. Within one year. 

5. Finally. 

44. What proportion of the workers in each case or class of 

work fell to a lower standard after having attained the 
rate habitually? 

45. What became of the workers who were rejected or 

dropped out when the task and bonus was introduced, 
and during its operation? 

a. Were efforts made to retain them? If so, what? 

b. To what extent were they given work elsewhere in 

this establishment? 

c. How did the wages of those given work elsewhere 

in this establishment compare with their former 
wages ? 

d. What became of those who were not retained in this 

establishment ? 

46. What was the average number of workers in each case 

or class of work after the task and bonus system was 
introduced as compared with the number previously? 
a. During the six months preceding the introduction of 
task and bonus. 



QUESTIONNAIRE 245 

b. During the six weeks succeeding the introduction of 

task and bonus. 

c. At present. How are these changes to be explained? 

47. What instruction and assistance are provided for the 

workers when and after the task and bonus is intro- 
duced ? 

a. Who are the instructors, and what is their proportion 

to the workers? 

b. How and by whom are these instructors selected? 

c. What are the qualifications required for these instruc- 

tors? 

d. What are their functions? Are they expected to give 

frequent and minute instructions? 

e. What is the kind and extent of the instruction? 

/. What is the method and purpose of the instruction? 
g. On what occasions is instruction given, and how does 
the worker go about to receive it? 

48. What is the nature of the instruction card used under the 

task and bonus system? 

a. General description. 

b. Concrete examples or samples. 

c. By what process do the workers secure the instruction 

cards ? 

49. Is the worker ever allowed to depart from the instruc- 

tions given on these cards — to invent new methods of his 
own ? If so, how ? Is the worker allowed or encouraged 
to make suggestions in regard to changes in instruc- 
tions and methods? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, how? 

50. What is the degree of punctuality, regularity and conti- 

nuity of the workers under task and bonus, as com- 
pared 

a. With the same workers before task and bonus was in- 

troduced ? 

b. As compared with the workers not under task and 

bonus ? 

51. What is the degree of variation of output from day to 

day, and week to week, of the individual workers under 
task and bonus, as compared 



246 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

a. With the same workers before task and bonus was in- 

troduced ? 

b. As compared with the workers not under task and 

bonus ? 

52. What is the amount of delay between tasks or jobs during 

the day, under the task and bonus system, or the amount 
of time when there is no work for the operator? 

a. As compared with the situation before the introduction 

of task and bonus? 

b. As compared with the workers not under task and 

bonus ? 

53. What is the amount of the basic or day wage in each class 

of work under the task and bonus system? 

54. What were the minimum, average and maximum earnings 

of the workers in each class of work before the intro- 
duction of the task and bonus system? 

55. What are the earnings in each class of work where the 

workers just make the task and no more? 

56. What have been the minimum and maximum earnings in 

each class of work under task' and bonus 

a. Within the past six months? 

b. Within any other period? 

57. In case there is no work for part of the day on the par- 

ticular task on which the worker is engaged 

a. Is he set at other tasks? 

b. If not, is he paid for this idle time? If so, at what 

rate ? 

c. Does he lose his bonus? 

58. What have been the actual average earnings, in each class 

of work, of the workers under task and bonus 

a. Within the past six months ? 

b. Within any other period? 

59. What have been the average earnings, in each class of 

work, of the workers who exceed the task 

a. Within the past six months? 

b. Within any other period? 

60. Is any maximum limit put upon the earnings of the work- 

ers under the task and bonus system? 

61. What system of inspection is used in connection with the 

task and bonus" system ? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 247 

62. Has the minuteness of inspection necessary to secure stand- 

ard product increased or decreased since the introduc- 
tion of task and bonus, and to what extent? 

63. What has been the quality of the work turned out since 

task and bonus was introduced, as compared with 
a. The same work and workers before its introduction? 
h. The sections of the shop not under task and bonus? 

64. How does the quantity of work turned out where the task 

and bonus system is in vogue, compare with the same 
sections of the shop before task and bonus was intro- 
duced? Give percentage result, and reasons for your 
answer. 

65. How has the introduction of the task and bonus system 

affected the cost of the product? 

a. The labor cost per unit? 

b. The final cost per unit? 

66. Do the workers under task and bonus show any evidence 

of overspeeding, overfatigue, or nervous and physical 

exhaustion 
a. Positively? 

h. As compared with the workers not under task and 
bonus ? 

67. Have the character, quality, sex and age of the workers 

changed where the task and bonus system has been in- 
troduced ? If so, how and why ? 

68. What has been the effect of task and bonus upon the spirit 

of the shop? 
a. Upon the attitude of the workers toward their work ? 
h. Upon the attitude of the workers toward the manage- 
ment? 

c. Upon the attitude of the workers toward their fellows 

in the group and shop ? 

69. Are the workers under task and bonus in this establish- 

ment generally satisfied with the system? 
o. If so, why do they like it? 
h. If not, what do they complain of in connection with it? 

70. Do the workers in this establishment seek to come under 

the task and bonus system? 
a. If so, why? 
&. If not, why not? 



248 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

71. Do the workers in the establishment prefer the task and 
bonus to any other system ? 
a. If so, how do they show it? 
&. If not, what system do they prefer and why? 
^2. What has been the effect of the introduction of the task 
and bonus system upon the attitude of the workers 
toward trade unionism? Or how do they regard it? 

73. Does the employer derive an advantage under the task 

and bonus system when the worker almost but does not 
quite make the task? 

a. If so, what? 

b. If not, why not? 

74. Does the task and bonus system tend to guarantee against 

arbitrary rate cutting and the arbitrary alteration of 
the task ? If so, how ? 

75. Is the task and bonus system of payment necessary in 

order that each worker should be paid in exact propor- 
tion to his efficiency? If so, why? 

y6. Is the task and bonus system necessary to secure reason- 
able or the highest efficiency? If so, in what classes of 
work and for what classes of workers and why? 

yy. Under the task and bonus system after it has been well 
established how many less workers does it take in the 
different classes of work, on the average, to do a job 
or to turn out a given amount of product than formerly, 
i.e., what are the proportions before and after? 



SCHEDULE IV-C 
The Premium System 

1. When and by whom was the premium system installed in 

this establishment? What system or systems of work 
and pay did it displace? 

2. For what classes of work is it employed, and what are 

the numbers, proportions, and sex of the workers in the 
establishment operating under it? 

3. What were the considerations which led to its adoption, 

and why was it adopted? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 249 

4. By whose authority was it introduced? 

5. Did the workers have any voice in determining whether 

it should be introduced or not? If so, what? 

6. Did the workers or any of them object to its introduction? 

If so, 
a. What class or classes of workers? 
h. To what extent? 

c. On what grounds, or from what causes? 

d. Were the objections of the workers considered? If 

so, in what manner? 

7. Is it, in general, desirable or practicable for the workers 

to have any voice in determining whether or not the 
premium system shall be introduced, or, after it is intro- 
duced, whether or not it shall be retained? 

a. If not, why not? 

h. If so, 

1. Which workers should have such a voice? 

2. How should the workers' choice be expressed? 

3. What consideration should be given to the work- 

ers' preference? 

4. How and by whom should a decision be reached? 

5. Should trade unions or trade union officials be 

allowed any voice in this matter? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, what? 

8. Is a basic or day wage established in connection with the 

premium system in this establishment, which is paid 
the workers who fail to attain the efficiency required in 
order that they shall receive premium payments? 
a. If so, on what basis is it calculated? 
&. How, by whom, and on what grounds was this basic or 
day wage fixed or determined for each class of work 
and workers? 

c. Did the workers have any voice in this matter? If 

so, what? 

d. Would it be desirable or practicable for the workers to 

have a voice in this matter? 

1. If not, why not? 

2. If so, what, and how should it be expressed? 

e. Would it be desirable or practicable to accept, as the 



250 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

basic or day wage in this connection, the standard 
rate or wage established by trade unions for the class 
of work in question? If not, why not? 
/. Is it desirable or practicable to change the basic or day 
wage after it has once been established in connection 
with the premium system? 
I.- If not, why not? 

2. If so, should the workers have any voice in this 
matter, and, if any, what, and how should it 
be expressed? 
g. Has the basic or day wage been changed or altered in 
any case in this establishment since the premium sys- 
tem was introduced? If so, how, and by whom, and 
to what extent ? 
h. What considerations might justify the changing of the 
basic or day wage; would industrial depression and a 
fall in general wages constitute a justification? 
9. By whom, and how, or on what grounds are the premium 
rates to be paid for each class of work and for each 
grade of efficiency determined? 

10. Have the workers any voice in this matter? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, how is it expressed, and what consideration is 

given to it? 

11. At what percentage of efficiency do the premium payments 

begin ? 

12. What is the scale of the premiums allowed for each class 

of work and workers? 

13. What considerations determine the fixing of the scale of 

premiums ? 

14. What factors are considered in determining the scale of 

premiums coordinated with the efficiency scale in each 
case, i.e., at what percentage of efficiency the premium 
shall begin, and the premium that shall be attached to 
each percentage of efficiency; just how are these mat- 
ters determined? 

15. Is the premium calculated by the hour, the day or over 

some longer period? If so, what? On what grounds 
is the period of calculation fixed ? If for a period longer 
than the day, why? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 251 

Just how are the premium payments calculated? 

a. General statement. 

h. Concrete illustration. 

When a worker on a given class or piece of work is found 

to be attaining the efficiency necessary to secure the 

premium payment, is he ever shifted to another class of 

work within the period for which premium payments 

are habitually calculated? If so, for what reasons? 
Is a worker ever placed upon a class or piece of work on 

which his efficiency is known or suspected to be less than 

on the work in which he was previously engaged? If 

so, for what reasons? 
What entitles a worker to a premium? 
a. What factors are considered? 
h. What facts and conditions demanded? 
What deprives a worker of a premium payment? 
a. What factors are considered? 
h. What facts and conditions determine? 
Who determines whether or not the premium shall be 

awarded ? 
Have the workers any voice in these matters? 
a. If so, .how is it expressed? 
h. What consideration is given to it? 
When the premium rates and scale for a class of work 

have beeii once fixed, are they ever changed? 
o. If not, why not? 

&. If so, by whose authority, why, and on what grounds? 

c. Have the workers any voice in this matter? If so, 

what workers, and how is it expressed? Are they 

consulted ? 

To what extent, if any, have the premium rates actually 

been changed in this establishment after having onca 

been fixed, and for what reasons? 
What considerations might justify the changing of the 

premium rate? 
When the premium system was introduced, was there any 

conscious effort to secure a select class of workers? 
If so, by what process were new workers selected, and old 

workers eliminated? What considerations governed? 

What tests were made? 



252 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

28. Do the workers now under the premium system represent 

a select class of higher skill with respect to sex, age, 
initial health, initial training, and ability superior to 
the old workers doing the same work? 

29. Since the premium system was introduced in this estab- 

lishment, what proportion of applicants for work have 
been hired? How does this compare with the situation 
before the premium system was introduced? 

30. Since the premium system was introduced in this estab- 

lishment, what number and proportion of newly hired 
workers have made good? 

31. When the premium system was introduced in each class of 

work in this establishment, 

a. What number and proportion of the workers who had 

been doing the work were rejected or dropped out of 
this particular work immediately, and for what rea- 
sons? 

b. What number and proportion were rejected or dropped 

out of this work within 

1. One month, and for what reasons? 

2. Three months, and for what reasons? 

3. One year, and for what reasons? 

c. What number and proportion of the workers who re- 

mained in the particular work, in each case, attained 
the efficiency necessary to secure the premium habit- 
ually ? 

1. Immediately. 

2. Within three weeks. 

3. Within three months. 

4. Within six months. 

5. Within one year. 

6. Finally. 

d. How long, on the average, did it take the workers who 

remained in each class of work to reach the point 
where they secured the premium habitually? 

e. What number of the workers in each class of work 

exceeded the efficiency necessary to secure the pre- 
mium payment? 

1. Within three weeks. 

2. Within three months. 



QUESTIONNAIRE 253 

3. Within six months. 

4. Within one year. 

/. What number and proportion of the workers who re- 
mained at the particular work in each class exceeded 
the efficiency necessary to secure a premium habitu- 
ally? 

1. Within three weeks. 

2. Within three months. 

3. Within six months. 

4. Within one year. 

5. Finally. 

What proportion of the workers in each case or class of 
work fall to a lower standard of efficiency after having 
habitually attained the efficiency necessary to secure a 
premium payment? 

What became of the workers who were rejected or dropped 
out when the premium system was introduced, and dur- 
ing its operation? 

a. Were efforts made to retain them? If so, what? 

h. To what extent were they given work elsewhere in the 
same establishment? 

c. How did the wages of those given work elsewhere 

in this establishment compare with their former 
wages ? 

d. What became of those who were not retained in this 

establishment ? 
What was the average number of workers in each case or 
class of work after the premium system was introduced 
as compared with the number previously? 
a. During the six months preceding the introduction of 

the premium system. 
h. During the six months succeeding the introduction of 
the premium system. 

c. At present. 

d. How are these changes to be explained? 

What instruction and assistance are provided for the work- 
ers when and after the premium system is introduced? 

a. Who are the instructors, and what is their proportion 

to the workers? 

b. How and by whom are these instructors selected? 



254 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

c. What are the qualifications required for these instruc- 

tors? 

d. What are their functions? Are they expected to give 

frequent and minute instructions? 

36. What is the nature of the instruction card used under the 

premium system? 
a. General description. 
h. Concrete example or sample. 

37. By what process does the worker secure the instruction 

card? 

38. Are the workers ever allowed to depart from the instruc- 

tions given, to invent and use methods of their own? 
If so, how? 

39. Is the worker allowed or encouraged to make suggestions 

in regard to changes in the instructions and methods? 
o. If so, how? 
h. If not, why not? 

40. What is the degree of punctuality and regularity and con- 

tinuity of the workers under the premium system, as com- 
pared 
a. With the same workers before the premium system was 

introduced ? 
h. As compared with the workers not under the premium 
system ? 

41. What is the degree of variation of output from day to day, 

and from week to week, of the individual workers under 
the premium system, as compared 
a. With the same workers before the premium system was 

introduced ? 
h. As compared with the workers not under the premium 
system ? 

42. What is the amount of delay between assigned pieces of 

work during the day under the premium system, i.e., the 
amount of time when there is no work for the opera- 
tor to do? 

a. As compared with the system before the introduction of 

the premium system ? 

b. As compared with the workers not under the premium 

system ? 

43. In case there is no work for part of the day, on the par- 



QUESTIONNAIRE 255 

ticular class of work on which a man is engaged in this 
establishment ? 

a. Is he set at other kinds of work? 

b. If not, is he paid for the idle time? If so, at what 

rate ? 

c. Does he lose his premium? 

What is the amount of the basic or day wage in each class 

of work under the premium system? 
What were the minimum, average, and maximum earnings 

of the workers in each class of work before the intro- 
duction of the premium system? 
What are the earnings in each class of work when the 

workers just reach the efficiency necessary to secure the 

premium ? 
What have been the minimum and maximum efficiency 

and earnings in each class of work under the premium 

system 

a. Within the past six months? 

b. Within any other period? 

What have been the actual average efficiency and earnings 
in each class of work of the workers under the premium 
system 

a. Within the past six months? 

b. Within any other period? 

What have been the average efficiency and earnings in each 
class of work of the workers who exceeded the efficiency 
necessary to secure a premium 

a. Within the past six months? 

b. Within any other period? 

Is any maximum limit put upon the earnings of the work- 
ers under the premium system? 

Have any workers under the premium system received 
earnings to any amount less than the basic or day wage 
for the class of work in question? If so, 

a. How much less? 

b. What number and proportion of workers? 

c. What has become of these men? 

1. Have they been discharged? 

2. Has other work in this establishment been found 

for them where they have been unable to at- 



256 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

tain an efficiency necessary to secure the basic 
wage or a premium? 

52. What system of inspection is used in connection with the 

premium system in this establishment? 

53. Has the minuteness of inspection necessary to secure stand- 

ard product increased or decreased since the introduc- 
tion of the premium system, and to what extent? 

54. What has been the quality of the work turned out 

since the premium system was introduced, as compared 
with 

a. The same work and workers before its introduction? 

b. The sections of the establishment not under the premium 

system ? 

55. How does the quantity of work turned out where the pre- 

mium system is in vogue compare with the same sec- 
tions of the establishment before the premium system 
was established? Give percentages, and reasons for 
your answer. 

56. How has the introduction of the premium system affected 

the costs of the product? 

a. The labor cost per unit. 

b. The final cost per unit. 

57. Do the workers under the premium system show any evi- 

dence of overspeeding, overfatigue, or nervous or phys- 
ical exhaustion? 

a. Positively. 

b. As compared with the workers not under the premium 

system. 

58. Have the character, quality, sex and age of the workers 

changed where the premium system has been intro- 
duced? If so, how and why? 

59. What has been the effect of the premium system upon the 

spirit of the shop? 

a. Upon the attitude of the workers toward their work? 

b. Upon the attitude of tlte workers toward the manage- 

ment? 

c. Upon the attitude of the workers toward their fellows 

in the group or shop ? 

60. Are the workers under the premium system in this estab- 

lishment generally satisfied with the system? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 257 

a. If so, why do they Hke it? 

h. If not, what do they complain of in connection with it? 

61. Do the workers in this estabHshment seek to come under 

the premium system ? 
a. If so, why? 
h. If not, why not? 

62. Do the workers in this establishment prefer the premium 

system to any other system? 

a. If so, how do they show it? 

h. If not, what system do they prefer and why? 
GT). What has been the effect of the introduction of the pre- 
mium system upon the attitude of the workers toward 
trade unionism? How do they regard it? 

64. Under the premium system, after it has been well estab- 

lished, how many less workers does it take in the dif- 
ferent classes of work as an average to do a job or 
turn out a given amount of product than formerly, i.e., 
what are the proportions before and after.? 

65. Is the premium system of payment necessary for securing 

reasonable or the highest efficiency? If so, for what 
classes of work and for what kinds of workers, and why? 

66. Is the premium system of payment necessary in order that 

each workman should be paid in exact proportion to his 
efficiency? If so, why? 

67. Is it possible to establish a just premium scale for each 

class of work? 
a. If so, how is the just scale to be arrived at or deter- 
mined ? 
h. What is the proof of its justice? 

68. Does the employer derive an advantage under the premium 

system when the worker almost but not quite makes the 
percentage of efficiency necessary to secure a premium 
payment ? 

a. If so, what? 

h. If not, why not? 

69. Does the premium system tend to guarantee against arbi- 

trary rate cutting? If so, how? 



258 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

SCHEDULE IV-D 
The Piece-Rate System 

1. What is the attitude of the management of this plant to- 

ward piece work as compared with day work? 

2. Does scientific management and especially elementary time 

study and task setting create opportunities for the 
substitution of piece work where day work existed be- 
fore? 

3. Is piece work more conducive to efficiency and more eco- 

nomical than day work? 
a. If so, why ? On what classes of work, under what cir- 
cumstances ? 
&. If not, why not? 

4. Does piece work as practiced in this plant lead the worker 

to drive himself? If so, do you attempt to control this 
in any way? If not, why not? 

5. Does a piece-work system net the worker higher wages 

than day work? 

6. Do the systems of payment employed by scientific manage- 

ment require piece work or tend to further its use? 

7. When and by whom was the piece-rate system installed in 

this establishment? 
a. What system or systems of pay did it displace? 

8. For what classes of work is it employed, and what are the 

number, proportion, and sex of the workers in the estab- 
lishment operating under it? 

9. What were the considerations which led to its adoption 

and why was it adopted? 

10. By whose authority was it introduced? 

11. Did the workers have any voice in determining whether it 

should be introduced or not? 
a. If so, what ? 

12. Did the workers or any of them object to its introduction? 

If so, 

a. What class or classes of workers ? 

b. To what extent ? 

c. Upon what grounds or from what causes? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 259 

d. Were the objections of the workers considered? If so, 
in what manner? 

13. Is it in general desirable or practicable for the workers 

to have any voice in determining whether or not the 
piece-rate system shall be introduced or after it is in- 
troduced whether or not it shall be retained? 

o. If not, why not? 

&. If so, why? 

1. Which workers should have such a voice? 

2. How should the workers' choice be expressed? 

3. What consideration should be given to the work- 

ers' preference? 

4. How and by whom should a decision be reached ? 

5. Should trade unions or trade union officials be 

allowed any voice in this matter? 
o. If not, why not? 
h. If so, what? 

14. Is a day wage or basic wage of any kind established with 

the piece-rate system in this shop, which is paid regard- 
less of piece-rate earnings? If so, 
a. How and by whom and on what grounds was this basic 

wage fixed for each class of work and workers ? 
h. Did the workers have any voice in this matter? If so, 
what? 

c. Would it be desirable or practicable ■ for the workers 

to have a voice in this matter? 

1. If not, why not? 

2. If so, why ? And how should it be expressed ? 

d. Would it be desirable or practicable to accept as the 

basic wage in this connection the standard rate or 
wage established by trade unions for the class of 
work in question? If not, why not? 

e. Is it desirable or practicable to change the day rate 

after it has once been established in connection with 
the piece-rate system? 

1. If not, why not? 

2. If so, should the workers have any voice in this 

matter, and, if any, what? And how should it 
be expressed? 

f. Has the basic or day wage been changed or altered in 



26o SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

any case in this establishment since the piece-rate 
system was introduced? 

a. If so, how, by whom and to what extent? 
g. What considerations and circumstances might justify 
the changing of basic or day wage; would industrial 
depression and fall in general wages constitute a 
justification? 

15. How, by whom and on what ground is the rate to be paid 

for each piece or lot determined? 

16. Have the workers any voice in this matter? If so, how is 

it expressed? What consideration is given to it? 

17. When a piece rate has once been established or fixed, is it 

ever changed or cut, raised or lowered? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, by whose authority, why and on what grounds? 

c. Have the workers any voice in this matter? 

1. If so, what workers and how is it expressed? 

2, Are they consulted? 

18. To what extent, if any, have the piece rates actually been 

changed in this establishment, and for what reasons? 

19. What considerations and circumstances might justify the 

changing of the piece rates? 

20. Where the number of units per lot has once been fixed 

is it ever changed? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, by whose authority, why, and on what grounds? 

c. Have the workers any voice in this matter? 

1. If so, what workers and how is it expressed? 

2. Are they consulted? 

21. To what extent, if any, have the number of units per lot 

been actually changed in this establishment after being 
once fixed? For what reasons? 

22. What considerations might justify the changing of the 

number of units per lot? 

23. What are the actual piece rates on the different classes 

of work under this system paid in this establishment? 

24. What considerations determine the fixing of the actual 

piece rates? 
o. Have the workers any voice in this matter? If so, 
how is it expressed, what consideration is given to it? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 261 

25. When the piece-rate system was introduced, was there any 

conscious effort to secure a select class of workers? 

26. If so, by what process were the new workers selected, and 

the old workers eliminated? 

27. What considerations goyerned and what tests were 

made? 

28. Do the workers now under the piece rate represent a select 

class of higher quality as respects age, sex, initial health, 
initial training and ability superior to the old workers 
doing the same work? 

29. When the piece-rate system was introduced in each class 

of work in this establishment, 

a. What number and proportion of the workers who had 
been doing the work were rejected or dropped out of 
their particular work immediately, and for what rea- 
sons? 

h. .What number and proportion were dropped out of their 
work within 

1. One month and for what reason? 

2. Three months and for what reason? 

3. One year and for what reason? 

c. What number and proportion of the work&rs who re- 

mained in the particular work habitually attained un- 
der the new system equal or greater earnings than 
under the old system? 

1. Immediately. 

2. Within three months. 

3. Within six months. 

4. Within one year. 

5. Finally. 

d. What number and proportion of the workers who re- 

mained at the particular work in each class under the 
new system found it impossible to gain as great earn- 
ings under the new system as under the old? 
30. What became of the workers who were rejected or dropped 
out when the piece-rate system was introduced and dur- 
ing its operation? 
a. Were efforts made to retain them? If so, what? 
h. To what extent were they given work elsewhere in this 
establishment ? 



262 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

c. How did the wages of those given work elsewhere in 

this establishment compare with their former wages? 

d. What became of those not retained? 

31. What was the average number of workers in each case or 

class of work after the piece-rate system was introduced 
as compared with the number previously? 
a. During the six months preceding the introduction of 

the piece rate. 
h. During the six months succeeding the introduction of 
the piece rate. 

c. At present. 

d. How are these changes to be explained? 

32. What instruction and assistance are provided for the 

workers when and after the piece-rate system is intro- 
duced ? 

a. Who are the instructors and what is their proportion to 
the workers? 

h. How and by whom are these instructors selected? 

c. What are the qualifications required of these instructors ? 

d. What are the character, minuteness and extent of the 

instruction actually given? 

33. What is the nature of the instruction card used under the 

piece-rate system ? 
a. General description. 
h. Concrete example. 

c. By what process does the worker secure the instruction 
card? 

34. Is the worker ever allowed to depart from the instruc- 

tions given on these cards, to invent and use methods 
of his own? 

35. Is the worker allowed and encouraged to make suggestions 

in regard to instructions and methods? 
a. If not, why not? 
h. If so, how? 

36. What is the degree of punctuality, regularity and continuity 

of the workers under the piece-rate system as compared 
a. With the same workers before the piece-rate system 

was introduced? 
&. As compared with workers not under the piece-rate 
system ? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 263 

37. What is the degree of variation of output from day to 

day and from week to week of the individual workers 
and of the group of workers under the piece-rate system, 
as compared 
a. With the same workers before the piece-rate system 

was introduced? 
h. As compared with the workers not under the piece- 
rate system? 

38. What is the amount of delay between jobs under the piece- 

rate system, i.e., the amount of time when there is no 
work for the operator, 
a. As compared with the situation before the introduction 

of the piece-rate system? 
h. As compared with the workers not under the piece- 
rate system? 

39. In case there is no work for the day or for part of the day 

of the particular kind on which the worker is engaged, 
a. Is he set at other tasks? 
h. Is he paid for this idle time? If so, on what basis? 

40. What were the average earnings of the workers in each 

class of work before the introduction of the piece-rate 
system ? 

41. What were the average, maximum and minimum earnings 

of the workers in each class after the introduction of 

the piece-rate system 
a. During the past six months? 
h. Within any other period? 

42. Have any of the workers under the piece-rate system 

earned less than the customary wage for the class of 
work in question in this region? 
a. If so, what have been their number and proportion in 

each class of work? 
h. What has been the amount of time during which they 
received these lower earnings compared with the time 
of their service? 
c. What has been the policy toward such workers? 

I. Have they been discharged, and, if so, after how 
long a period? 
2. Has any effort been made to place them in other 
lines where they could make average earnings 



264 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

and, if so, what has been the success attending 
these efforts? 

43. Is any maximum limit put on earnings under the piece- 

rate system? 

44. What is the system of inspection used in connection with 

the piece-rate system? 

45. Has the minuteness of inspection necessary to secure 

standard product increased or decreased since the intro- 
duction of the piece-rate system and to what extent? 

46. What has been the quality of the work turned out since 

the introduction of the piece-rate system as compared 
with 

a. The same work and workers before its introduction? 

b. The sections of this establishment not under the piece- 

rate system? 

47. How does the quantity of work turned out where the piece- 

rate system is established compare with that in the same 
sections before the piece rate was established? 

48. How has the introduction of the piece-rate system affected 

the cost of the product? 

a. The labor cost per unit. 

b. The final cost per unit. 

49. Do the workers under the piece-rate system show any 

evidence of overspeeding, overfatigue or nervous and 
physical exhaustion? 

a. Positively. 

b. As compared with workers not under the piece-rate 
system. 

50. What has been the effect of the piece-rate system upon 

the spirit of the shop ? 

a. Upon the attitude of the workers toward their work? 

b. Upon the attitude of the workers toward the manage- 

ment? 

c. Upon the attitude of the workers toward their fellows 

in group and shop? 

51. Are the workers under the piece-rate system in this estab- 

lishment generally satisfied with the system? 

a. If so, why do they like it ? 

b. If not, of what do they complain and to what do they 

object in connection with it ? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 265 

52. Do the workers in this establishment seek to come under 

the piece-rate system? 
a. If so, why? 
&. If not, why not? 

53. Do the workers here prefer the piece-rate system to any 

other system? 
a. If so, how do they show it? 
h. If not, what system do they prefer and why? 

54. What has been the effect of the introduction of the piece- 

work system upon the attitude of the workers toward 
trade unionism? How do they regard it? 

55. Are piece rates necessary to secure reasonable or highest 

efficiency ? 
a. If so, what kinds of work and in the cases of what 
kinds of workers and why? 

56. Is the piece-rate system necessary in order that each 

worker should be paid in exact proportion to his effi- 
ciency ? 

57. Is it possible to establish a just piece rate for each class 

of work? 
a. If so, how is the just rate to be arrived at or deter- 
mined? What is the proof of its justice? 

58. Under the piece-rate system, after it has been well estab- 

lished, how many less workers does it take in the dif- 
ferent classes of work, on the average, to do a job or 
turn out a given amount of product than formerly, i.e., 
what are the proportions before and after? 

59. When task and bonus have been substituted for the piece 

rate are the workers healthier and more at ease or are 
they pushed? 

SCHEDULE V 

Hiring, Discharge, Discipline, Security and Continuity of 
Employment 

1. By whose authority are workers hired for this establish- 

ment? 

2. Have the wage-working employees of this establishment 

any voice in this matter of hiring workers? If so, 
what? 



266 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

3. Should the wage-working employees of this establishment 

have any voice in the matter of hiring workers, espe- 
cially with respect to the age, sex, nationality, character, 
habits, training and skill, industrial affiliations, and num- 
bers of the prospective workmen? 

a. If so, what and why? 

b. If not, why not? 

4. Should the unions or the officials of the unions to which 

the wage-working employees of this establishment belong 
have any voice in these matters? 

a. If so, what and why? 

b. If not, why not? 

5. By whom are the wage-workers actually hired in this 

establishment? 

6. What is the main source of supply of the workers of this 

establishment? Is it local or non-local? If the latter, 
from what locality, city or country do the workers mainly 
come to the shop ? 

7. How are the candidates for jobs secured, and what fac- 

tors are taken into consideration in determining whether 
a particular worker shall be hired or not, e.g., what 
inquiries are made, what qualities and qualifications are 
considered and demanded, what proofs are required, 
what tests are made? 

a. General statement. 

b. Description of the process connected with the hiring 

of workmen. 

8. In securing workers for this establishment, is any use 

made of employment agencies of any kind? If so, what 
kind or kinds, and to what extent? 

9. In hiring workers does the management give preference 

to skilled, semi-skilled, or unskilled workers? If so, 
why ? Is there anything in the statement that the best 
results are secured from those who are taken unskilled, 
or semi-skilled, and trained in the shop from the begin- 
ning? If so, why? 
10. In hiring, is any inquiry made in regard to the industrial 
affiliation of the prospective workers; in hiring, is any 
discrimination made in favor of or against union 
workers? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 267 

11. Who has the final authority in the matter of the discharge 

of wage-workers from this establishment? 

12. Have the wage-workers, as a body, any voice in this 

matter ? 
a. If not, why not? 
h. If so, what, and how is it exercised? 

13. Should the wage-workers, as a body, have any voice in 

this matter of discharge? 
a. If not, why not? 
h. If so, what, and how should it be exercised? 

14. Should the unions or the officials of the unions, to which 

the wage-working employees of this establishment be- 
long, have any voice in the matter of discharge of em- 
ployees? 

a. If so, what and why? 

h. If not, why not? 

15. By whom are the wage-workers in this establishment actu- 

ally discharged? 

16. On what grounds are wage-workers discharged, or what 

constitute effective causes of discharge ? 

17. What is the actual process of discharge, e.g., where do 

complaints originate; to whom are they made, to whom 
transmitted; what, if any, investigation is made of com- 
plaints; how are they considered; how and on what 
grounds is the final decision reached? 

a. General descriptive account. 

b. Concrete illustration. 

18. Have the workers of whom complaints are made any right 

of explanation, defense or appeal? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, how is it exercised, and considered, i.e., to 

whom may they appeal, and what consideration is 
given to this appeal? 

c. Is any definite machinery or process established for such 

appeals? If so, what? 

19. In the matter of discharge, is any inquiry made in regard 

to the affiliations of the worker; is any discrimination 
made in favor of or against a union worker? 

20. Is notice given to workers before discharge? If so, how 

long? 



268 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

21. In making discharges, or cutting down the force, what 

consideration is given to the relative skill and wages 
of workers ? Are skilled and high-wage workers ever 
discharged to make room for less skilled and lower-wage 
workers ? 

22. Are any records kept of the individual wage-workers in this 

establishment? If so, 
a. What is the form of the record, and what items of in- 
formation does it call for? 

1. General account. 

2. Concrete illustration. 

h. For what purpose or purposes are these records kept? 

c. What are the sources of this information? 

d. Has the worker or have the workers any voice in 

determining what shall go into these records? 

e. Is information contained in these records ever given 

to any other employer of labor or association of 
employers? If so, for what purposes? 
/. Does the management attempt to keep this informa- 
tion from outsiders? Does it guarantee secrecy in 
this matter? 
2"^. Have you a regular shop disciplinarian? If so, what 
are his powers and duties ? 

24. Has the management of this establishment installed any 

definite system or method of recording merit or demerit 
of workers? If so, what are its character and pur- 
poses and how does it operate ? 

25. What persons or officials have power and authority to 

discipline wage-workers in this establishment? 

26. What is the disciplinary power or authority of each of 

these persons or officials? 

27. Who has the final authority in the matter of discipline ? 

28. Have the workers, as individuals or as a body, any voice 

in determining the character of discipline, or the mode 

of exercising disciplinary authority? 
o. If not, why not? 
&. If so, what, and how is it exercised? 

29. Should trade unions or the officials of trade unions, to 

which the workers in the establishment may belong, 
have any voice in the matter of discipline? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 269 

a. If not, why not? 

h. If so, what, and how should it be exercised? 

30. What are the punishable offenses in this establishment, 

and what are the actual and possible penalties attached 
to each? 

31. Have the wage-workers any voice in this matter? 
a. If not, why not? 

h. If so, what, and how is it exercised? 

32. What is the actual process by which discipline is measured 

out? 
a. General statement. 
h. Concrete illustration. 

33. What instructions are given to shop foremen or assistant 

foremen in regard to the treatment of the workers? 

34. What is the disciplinary power and activity of shop fore- 

men or assistant foremen as compared with the situation 
a. Before scientific management was installed? 
h. As compared with this power or activity in the non- 
scientific management sections of the shop? 

35. Are the workers fined or docked for breaches of dis- 

cipline? If so, 
a. For what offenses? 
h. To what extent? 

36. What is the method in this establishment of dealing with 

spoiled work and spoiled materials? How is the re- 
sponsibility in such cases determined? What penalties 
are imposed on the workers responsible for spoiled work 
or materials? 

37. What is the method in this establishment of dealing with 

machine and tool breakage or damage? How is the re- 
sponsibility determined? What penalties are imposed 
on the workers responsible? 

38. Has the establishment a distinct and separate employment, 

personnel or labor department? If so, 
a. When and for what purposes was it established? 
h. What is its personnel? 

c. What are its powers and duties? 

d. How does it exercise its functions? 

39. What are the training and record of the head of the labor 

department ? 



270 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

40. Have the workers any voice in respect to the labor depart- 

ment? If so, what, and how is it exercised? 

41. Should the workers have any voice in respect to the labor 

department ? 
a. If so, what, and how should it be exercised? 
h. If not, why not? 
c. Is this a proper place for trade union cooperation? 

42. Have the workers in this establishment any complaints or 

proposals to make in regard to hiring, discharge and 
discipline ? 
a. If so, what? 

43. What are the number and proportion of the workers in 

each class of work under scientific management, who 

have been hired 
a. Within the past three months? 
h. Within the past six months? 

c. Within the past year? 

d. Within the past two years? 

e. Since scientific management was installed? 

44. How does this record compare with the situation 
a. Before scientific management was installed? 

h. In the non-scientific management sections of the estab- 
lishment ? 

45. What are the number and proportion of the workers in 

each class of work under scientific management who 
have been discharged 

a. Within the past three months? 

b. Within the past six months? 

c. Within the past year? 

d. Within the past two years? 

e. Since scientific management was installed? 

46. How does this record compare with the situation 
a. Before scientific management was installed? 

h. In the non-scientific management sections of the estab- 
lishment? 

47. What has been the average yearly turnover of labor, i. e,, 

the percentage of the total workers in this establish- 
ment hired each year? 

a. Since scientific management was installed? 

b. Before scientific management was installed? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 271 

48. What have been the average number and proportion of 

cases of discipline, docking and fining, per month, in the 
different classes of work under scientific management, 

a. As compared with the average number and proportion, 

in the same classes of work, before scientific manage- 
ment was installed? 

b. As compared with the average number and proportion 

in the non-scientific management sections of the estab- 
lishment ? 

49. Does the establishment employ workers in split shifts or 

the off-and-on system? If so, what have been the 
average number and proportion of workers in split- 
shifts 

a. Since scientific management was installed, as compared 

with the time before it was installed? 

b. In the scientific management sections of the shop as 

compared with the non-scientific management sec- 
tions ? 

50. What have been the extreme variations in the number of 

workers employed 

a. Since scientific management was installed, as compared 

with the time before it was installed? 
6. In the scientific management sections of the establish- 
ment as compared with the non-scientific management 
sections? 

51. What have been the average yearly number and propor- 

tion of part-time workers employed 
o. In the establishment since scientific management was 
installed as compared with the time before it was 
installed ? 

b. In the scientific management sections of the establish- 

ment as compared with the non-scientific management 
sections ? 

52. What has been the average length of service of wage- 

working employees 

a. Since scientific management was iiistalled, as compared 

with the time before it was installed? 

b. In the scientific management sections of the establish- 

ment, as compared with the non-scientific management 
sections ? 



272 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

53. What have been the relative sex proportions of wage- 

workers in this establishment 

a. In the different classes of work under scientific man- 

agement as compared with the same classes of work 
before scientific management was installed? 

b. In the scientific management sections of the establish- 

ment, as compared with the non-scientific management 
sections ? 

54. What have been the number and proportion of wage- 

working employees above the ages of 30, 40, 50, and 60, 
respectively, 

a. In the different classes of work under scientific man- 

agement, as compared with the same classes of work 
before scientific management was installed? 

b. In the scientific management sections of the establish- 

ment, as compared with the non-scientific management 
sections ? 

55. When scientific management was installed in this estab- 

lishment, or in any section of it, were efficient and 
high-priced workers displaced for less efficient and lower- 
priced workers? If so, why? 

56. When scientific management was installed, was the wage- 

working force cut down? If so, to what extent, and for 
what reasons? If not, why not? 

57. What has been the average extent of the wage-working 
. force since scientific management was installed as com- 
pared with the preceding year? How is this change 
to be explained? 



SCHEDULE VI 

Vocational Selection, Specialization, Standardization, 
Instruction and Training, Advancement, Promotion 
AND Demotion of Workers 

1. By whom are workers assigned tasks or kinds of work, 

and shifted from one kind of work to another? 

2. What is the process by which a worker is assigfned to a 

particular line of work? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 273 

a. General statement. 

b. Concrete illustration, 

3. What facts or factors are taken into consideration in 

■determining the kind of work to which a worker shall 
be assigned? 

4. In making the assignment of work, what weight is given 

to the choice and inclination of the worker? 

5. In making the assignment of work: 

a. Are any psychological tests of the worker made? If 

so, what? 

b. Are any physiological tests of the worker made? If 

so, what? 

c. Is the Blackford method used to any extent? 

d. Is the Schneider method used to any extent? 

e. Are any studies of fatigue made? If so, what? 

/. Are time and motion studies made in this connection ? 

6. Is the final assignment made mainly with reference to the 

physical and psychological characteristics of the worker, 
or is it worked out mainly by "trial and error" ? 

7. What is the final standard of judgment as to the validity 

of work assignment? If the worker "makes good" at 
the work to which he is assigned, is this considered to 
be a final test of the matter ? Is he then considered to be 
properly assigned? 

8. What is the method of proof adopted in this establishment 

to show that a particular task is accomplishable under 
the conditions demanded? Can any particular worker 
demand that the proof be offered in his particular case? 
If not, why not? If so, how, and how is the demand 
treated ? 

9. Should the worker always be assigned to the line of work 

in which he shows the highest immediate efficiency? 

a. If so, why? 

b. If not, why not ? 

10. Is the worker usually quickly fitted into his proper line 

of work, or does the process of adaptation usually take 
considerable time? 

11. In dividing the work into tasks or operations, is a high 

degree of specialization or division of labor aimed at? 

12. How far should this specialization of operations or division 



274 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

of labor be carried? Is there any rule or law which 
should govern this matter? If so, what? 

13. In the different classes of work under scientific manage- 

ment in this establishment, is the specialization of tasks 
or operations greater or less than 
a. In the classes of work not under scientific manage- 
ment? 
h. In the same classes of work, before scientific manage- 
ment was installed? 

14. Under scientific management, as carried on in this estab- 

lishment, are the old distinct crafts and trades recog- 
nized and maintained, or are they broken up and oblit- 
erated, and the subordinate operations recombined into 
new mechanical sequences? 

15. What is the law or principle governing mechanical se- 

quence under scientific management, as practiced in this 
establishment ? 

16. Is it good economy for all of the workers to learn and 

perform more than one task or operation ? 

17. If not, what proportion of the workers in the different 

groups or classes can be thus taught with due considera- 
tion for economy? 

18. Is it good economy for any of the workers to learn and 

perform all the operations of a given craft or trade 
as it at present exists in the industry, generally? 

19. If so, what proportion of the workers of the different 

groups or classes can thus be taught with due considera- 
tion for economy? 

Note. — The term routing in the following questions refers to 
workers, and means the systematic transfer of the worker from task 
to task or from kind of work to kind of work, with the idea of 
broadening his skill and industrial capacity. 

20. To what extent is it economical to "route" the different 

workers of the different groups or classes 
a. With respect to the number of tasks or operations to be 

performed ? 
h. With respect to the number and proportion of the 
workers in each group or class ? 

21. What are the main reasons for or against the routing of 

the workers? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 275 

22. To what extent are the workers of the different classes 
not routed or routed in this establishment: 
a. Not routed: 

1. What number and proportion of the workers in 

the different groups or classes have performed 
but a single task or operation? 

2. What number and proportion of such workers in 

each group or class, who have performed but 
a single task or operation, have been in service 

a. One year ? 

b. Two years ? 

c. Three years ? 

3. What is the maximum term of service of any 

such worker in this establishment? 

4. Has the installation of scientific management 

affected the situation ? If so, how ? 
&. Completely routed: 

1. What have been the number and proportion of 

the workers in the different groups or classes 
who have learned and performed all the opera- 
tions of a given craft or trade 

a. Since scientific management was in- 

stalled ? 

b. Before scientific management was in- 

stalled ? 

c. How do the scientific management and the 

non-scientific management sections of 
the establishment compare in this re- 
spect ? 

2. How long has been the average term of service 

in connection with a single task or operation 
of the workers completely routed 

a. Since scientific management was in- 

stalled ? 

b. Before scientific management was in- 

stalled ? 

c. How do the scientific management and 

the non-scientific management sections 
of the establishment compare in this re- 
spect ? 



276 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

c. Partially routed: 

1. What have been the number and proportion of 

the workers in the different groups or classes 
who have performed a plurality of tasks or 
operations 

a. Since scientific management was in- 

stalled ? 

b. Before scientific management was in- 

stalled ? 

c. How do the scientific management and 

the non-scientific management sections 
of the establishment compare in this re- 
spect ? 

2. What has been the average number of opera- 

tions performed by the workers partially routed 
in each of the groups or classes in the estab- 
lishment 

a. Since scientific management was in- 

stalled ? 

b. Before scientific management was in- 

stalled ? 

c. How do the scientific management and 

the non-scientific management sections of 
the establishment compare in this respect ? 

3. How long has been the average term of service 

of the workers partially routed in connection 
with a single operation 

a. Since scientific management was in- 

stalled ? 

b. Before scientific management was in- 

stalled ? 

c. How do the scientific management and 

the non-scientific management sections 
of the establishment compare in this re- 
spect ? 

23. Does or can scientific management through routing lessen 

the necessity for a shop reserve of workers? 

24. Are time and motion study essential to the proper routing 

of the workers in the shop as well as of the jobs and 
material? If so, why? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 277 

25. What in your opinion does the term "apprenticeship" 

imply ? 

26. Does this establishment have a definitely outlined course 

of instruction and experience under which young work- 
ers are taught all of the knowledge and skill which 
would be expected of a first-class mechanic? If so, 
describe character of training and instruction given, and 
method of supervision of instructors in charge of the 
course, 

27. In your opinion, is a systematic training of young men 

or women in all of the branches of a trade advisable 
under scientific management? If so, why? If not, 
why not? 

28. Does the first-class mechanic, under scientific manage- 

ment, prove more efficient in this establishment than the 
unskilled workers who have been trained to perform the 
special class of work to which they are assigned? 

a. If so, why? 

b. If not, why not? 

29. Are there any types of machine, or forms of production 

in this establishment which require the use of gangs or 
crews of workmen to work together? 

a. If so, what? 

b. What is the mode of payment of the gang? 

c. How are the total earnings divided among the indi- 

viduals composing the gang? 

d. How is the speed of each individual composing the 

gang or crew regulated so that the highest efficiency 
of the group is secured? 

30. In gang or crew production, is it advantageous to intro- 

duce the contest principle, stimulating one gang or crew 
to develop a higher degree of production than the other ? 

a. If so, why? 

b. If not, why not? 

31. Are the workers in this establishment in the different classes 

of work under scientific management actually more or 
less specialized in their work 

a. Than the workers in the same classes of work before 

scientific management was installed? 

b. Than the workers not under scientific management? 



278 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

32. What would be your definition of 

a. A skilled craftsman ? 

b. A skilled mechanic? 

c. An unskilled worker? 

d. A semi-skilled worker? 

e. A hand man ? 

33. Does the coming of the efficiency systems prove of par- 

ticular advantage to the unskilled, semi-skilled and 
handy man, and to what extent? 

34. What are the number and proportion in this establishment 

of skilled craftsmen, skilled mechanics, unskilled work- 
ers, semi-skilled workers, handy men? 

a. In the different classes of work under scientific man- 

agement as compared with the classes of work not 
under scientific management ? 

b. In the different classes of work under scientific man- 

agement as compared with the same classes of work 
before scientific management was installed? 

35. Do the advanced wage systems prove themselves particu- 

larly advantageous to a particularly skilled group, or 
are they of equal advantage to the general level of 
workers ? 

36. Are the workers under scientific management, in this estab- 

lishment, given an opportunity to change their special 
tasks, operations or line of work when they so desire? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, on what conditions, and under what circum- 

stances ? 

37. How often are the workers thus allowed to change their 

special tasks or lines of work? 

38. Are the workers encouraged or urged so to change the 

character of their work? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, under what circumstances? 

39. Does the average worker under scientific management, in 

this establishment, thus have the opportunity of learn- 
ing a trade? 

40. Does scientific management add to the worker's general 

ability 
a. As a worker for the particular job he is on? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 279 

h. As a possibility for other jobs? 
c. As a citizen? 

41. Is the mechanical ability of the average worker under 

scientific management, in this establishment, broader or 
narrower 

a. Than the average ability of the worker in this estab- 

lishment not under scientific management? 

b. Than the average ability of the worker in this estab- 

lishment before scientific management was installed? 

c. What are the proofs of these statements? 

42. Just what is meant by the statement that scientific man- 

agement eliminates pace setters? What is meant by 
pace setters and how are they eliminated in your estab- 
lishment ? 

43. Just what is meant by "speeders" and just how does 

scientific management "turn speeders into instructors" ? 

44. Is there any limit put upon the speed, efficiency or output 

of individual workers in this establishment? 

45. Does the management desire to have the workers exceed 

the task set? 
a. If so, to what extent? 
&. If not, why not? 

46. How are foremen and assistant foremen and superintend- 

ents and assistant superintendents in this plant paid? 
Do they receive any remuneration in the form of pre- 
miums or bonuses ? Does their pay depend at all upon 
anything connected with the work of the employees 
under them? If so, how? 

47. How great is the incentive to foremen and assistant fore- 

men to see that all workers under them make bonuses, 
and, if a bonus is paid for each successful worker under 
them, is a special bonus paid if all are successful? 

48. What is the effect of this relation between the foreman, 

assistant foreman or gang boss and the workers under 
him upon his attitude towards and dealings with the 
workers ? 

49. Is there any guarantee that he will become a more effec- 

tive instructor rather than a driver of the workmen? 
What has been your experience in this connection? 

50. Are the modes of payment employed by scientific manage- 



28o SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

ment necessary for the elimination of the need for pace 
setters, and the turning of speeders into instructors? If 
so, why? 

51. Are the modes of payment employed by scientific manage- 

ment necessary for the elimination of systematic soldier- 
ing? If so, why? 

52. Is the speed of workers under scientific management set 

with reference to long-time effects upon the workers and 
long-time productive results? If so, what method is 
adopted for the determination of these effects ? 

53. Just what do you mean by standardization of perform- 

ance? Does scientific management standardize per- 
formance ? 

54. Are the modes of payment employed by scientific manage- 

ment necessary to the standardization of performance? 
If so, why? 

55. Who are the instructors of the workers in the scientific 

management departments of this establishment? 

56. What are the number and proportion of the instructors 

to the workers in the scientific management sections of 
this establishment? 

57. How were these instructors recruited? 

58. Are instructors paid by the hour, day, week, or are they 

under annual salary? Do they receive any form of 
bonus, premium or other form of additional remunera- 
tion? If so, what and why? 

59. What are the training and record of each of these instruc- 

tors? 

60. What is the character of the instruction given to the 

workers in this establishment, under scientific manage- 
ment? What does it include, specifically? 

a. General statement. 

b. Concrete illustration. 

61. Is the main object of instruction to teach the worker how 

to produce more or how to produce more by simpler 
and better methods and with less effort? If the latter, 
what actual cases can be pointed to in this shop as 
proofs ? 

62. Do the workers have any voice in determining who their 

instructors shall be, in their selection? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 281 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, what, and how is it exercised? 

63. Do the workers have any voice in determining what and 

how much instruction they shall receive? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, what, and how is it exercised? 

64. Can and do the workers make complaints against the 

instructors ? 

a. If not, why not? 

b. If so, to whom, how, and what consideration is given 

to these complaints ? 

65. Do the workers have any voice in determining whether 

instructors shall be retained or discharged? 
o. If not, why not? 
b. If so, what, and how is it exercised? 

66. What, in general, are the relations between the instructors 

and workers? 

a. Are they cordial or strained? 

b. Do the workers look upon the instructors as helpers 

or drivers? 
6y. Do the modes of payment employed by scientific manage- 
ment promote the training of workmen? If so, how? 

68. Are the workers at a task or operation held responsible for 

the work and discipline of helpers? 

69. Are the more competent workers held responsible for the 

training and instruction of beginners? 

70. What determines the amount of attention given to indi- 

vidual workers by instructors? Are there any general 
rules governing this? 

71. What inducements, if any, are offered to the workers to 

make suggestions in regard to improvements in methods 
of work or new tools and processes? 

72. Is any pressure brought to bear upon individuals in this 

establishment to bring out their best capacity and per- 
formance as to speed, efficiency and output? 

73. Are special inducements ever held out to individuals of 

more than ordinary capacity and ambition in this estab- 
lishment to make the most of themselves in the way of 
speed, efficiency and output? 

74. What is meant under scientific management by 



282 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

a. Advancement? 

h. Promotion? 

c. Demotion? 
75. What are the grounds for advancement and p-romotion, re- 
spectively, of the workers under scientific management, 
in this establishment? Are seniority and "seniority 
rights" considered? 
y6. Have the workers under scientific management, in this 
establishment, any voice in the matter of advancement, 
promotion and demotion? 

a. If not, why not? 

h. If so, how is it exercised? 

77. What have been the numbers and proportions of work- 

ers in the different classes of work in this establishment 
under scientific management advanced each year? 

78. What has been the average increase of wages for workers, 

as the result of such advancement? 

79. What have been the average yearly number and propor- 

tion of the workers in the different classes of work, 
under scientific management in this establishment, pro- 
moted each year: 
o. As compared with the workers not under scientific 

management ? 
h. As compared with the situation before scientific manage- 
ment was installed? 

80. What have been the average yearly numbers and propor- 

tions of the workers, under scientific management in 
this establishment, who have left the establishment to 
go to better, higher positions each year: 
a. As compared with the workers not under scientific man- 
agement ? 
h. As compared with the situation before scientific man- 
agement was installed? 

81. What are the proportions of skilled, semi-skilled, and un- 

skilled workers in the different classes of work, under 
scientific management, in this establishment? 
a. As compared with the same classes of work before 

scientific management was installed. 
h. As compared with the workers in the sections of the 
establishment not under scientific management. 



QUESTIONNAIRE 283 

82. If it is proved that a task assigned in this establishment 

is not accomplishable by a particular worker, what action 
follows ? 

83. Are there any punishments or special disadvantages 

placed upon those workers in your plant who fall behind 
the speed and accomplishment of the group? If so, 
what? 

84. Are workers who, after suflficient time, do not more or 

less regularly gain increased reward, kept in their old 
places, and by any method of encouragement or dis- 
crimination incited to greater effort? 

85. It is a claim of scientific management that each worker 

is assigned to a definite accomplishable task. How is 
this end attained in this establishment? What is the 
proof that k is true in this establishment? 

86. How in this establishment do you attempt to offset the 

common tendency for the exceptionally efficient worker 
to be held down to the pace of the crowd? 

87. Does a system of immediate rewards tend to injure the 

character of the worker in that it diminishes his sense 
of responsibility for doing other work which must be 
done without immediate reward equally well? 

88. What is the basis of judgment in this establishment as to 

what is a fair day's work and what is the method of 
arriving at the determination of a fair day's work in 
practice ? 

89. What, in your estimation, constitutes a good workman ? 

What are the characteristics of a good workman in the 
matter of qualities, training, attitudes, habits and affilia- 
tions ? 

90. What, in your estimation, constitutes a good employer? 

SCHEDULE VII-A 
[Designed for Employers] 

Effect on Character and Relations of the Workers 

I. What tests can be applied under scientific management 
to determine the character and degree of mechanical 
skill or craft possessed by workers ? 



284 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

2. Do these tests render unnecessary the element of personal 

judgment applied in selecting or promoting workmen in 
establishments where the methods of scientific manage- 
ment have not been introduced? 

3. Is the same degree of craft or mechanical skill required 

of workmen under scientific management as in plants 
where scientific management is not applied? 

a. If so, why? 

&. If not, why not? 

4. What has been the average percentage of punctuality of 

workers in the scientific management sections of this 
establishment ? 
a. As compared with the time before scientific manage- 
ment was installed? 
h. As compared with the non-scientific management sec- 
tions ? 

5. What has been the average percentage of time lost per 

worker on account of sickness and accident in the scien- 
tific management sections of the establishment? 
a. As compared with the same sections before scientific 

management was installed? 
h. As compared with the non-scientific management sec- 
tions ? 

6. Do you believe that scientific management reduces or 

mitigates the m'onotony incident to modern machine 
industry ? 
a. What grounds have you for this belief? 
h. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment? 
c. Have you any special method or methods for mitigat- 
ing the monotony of repetitive work? If so, 
what? 

7. Do you believe that scientific management tends to develop 

the workers' sense of personal achievement? 
a. What grounds have you for this belief? 
h. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 
of this establishment? 

8. Do you believe that scientific management puts interest, 

joy and zest into the workers' labor? 
a. What grounds have you for this belief? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 285 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 
of this establishment? 
9. Do you believe that scientific management stimulates the 
workers' inventive genius? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment? 

10. Do you believe that scientific management energizes the 

workers intellectually ? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment? 

11. Do you believe that scientific management promotes the 

workers' self-reliance, self-respect, individuality, person- 
ality and dignity? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment? 

12. Do you believe that scientific management develops and 

broadens the workers' mechanical skill ? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment? 

13. Do you believe that scientific management trains the work- 

ers in mechanical knowledge as they were never trained 
before ? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment? 

14. Do you believe that scientific management tends to induce 

habits of industry, temperance and saving on the part 
of workers, and tends to elevate them morally and so- 
cially ? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment? 

15. Do you believe that scientific management eliminates the 

suspicions of employers that the workmen are soldiering 
or gaining an unfair advantage? 
a. What grounds have you for this belief? 



286 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 
of this establishment? 
i6. Do you believe that scientific management promotes 
friendly feeling between the management and the men? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment? 
17. To what extent does scientific management prevent com- 
plaints against the management by the mer ? 
a. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 
of this establishment? 
i8. To what extent does scientific management eliminate sus- 
picion of the management by the men ? 
a. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 
of this establishment? 

19. Do you believe that scientific management causes the work- 

ers to regard their employers as their best friends? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief ? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment? 

20. Do you believe that scientific management makes the 

men in the shops more manly, truthful and straightfor- 
ward? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment ? 

21. Do you believe that scientific management eliminates the 

hampering of the strong and willing by the weak and 
unwilling ? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment? 

22. Do you believe that scientific management prevents the 

more efficient workers from being held back and de- 
moralized by the inefficient? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment? 

23. Do you believe that scientific management promotes 

friendly feeling and action among the workers of the 



QUESTIONNAIRE 287 

shop or group, makes the workers under scientific man- 
agement more cheerful and helpful than under the pre- 
vious forms of management? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment? 

24. Do you believe that scientific management sets each man 

to the highest task for which his physical and intellectual 
capacity fits him? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment? 

25. Do you believe that scientific management opens the way 

for all workmen to become "first-class men" in some 
employment ? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment ? 

26. Do you believe that scientific management insures just 

treatment of the individual worker ? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment? 

27. Do you believe that scientific management stimulates the 

thought and ambitions of the workers? 
o. What grounds have you for this belief? 
b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 
of this establishment? 

28. To what extent is the continuous performance of simple 

and uniform tasks or operations distasteful to the 
workers or injurious to them mentally and phys- 
ically ? 

29. Do you find workers who thrive on simple and uniform 

tasks? What grounds have you for your position? 
What proofs can you offer from the labor experiences 
of this establishment ? 

30. Are there in this establishment any methods in use for 

stimulating competition in skill or output between groups 
of workers or sections or departments of the shop? If 
so, what? 



288 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

31. Do you believe that scientific management prevents the 

introduction or development of the "contest principle" 
among workmen? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you supply from the labor experiences 

of this establishment? 

32. What are the home and living conditions of the workers 

under scientific management as compared with the same 
classes of workers not under scientific management in 
this region ? Have you any records to substantiate your 
answer ? 

33. Have the social habits of the workers under scientific 

management and their mode of spending their leisure 
time changed since they came under scientific manage- 
ment? If so, how? 

34. What, if any, labor troubles, giving dates and periods, 

have occurred in this establishment while scientific man- 
agement was being installed or since its installation? 

a. Did the workers in the scientific management sections 

of this establishment take any part in these troubles ? 
If so, what? 

b. Did these workers actually go out on strike? 

c. What were the complaints of the workers? Did they 

touch directly the use of scientific management or 
any of its policies and methods? If so, what? 

d. In what manner were these difficulties settled? 



SCHEDULE VII-B 
[Designed for Employees] 

Effect on Character and Relations of the Workers 

[. Do you believe that scientific management enables un- 
skilled and underpaid workmen to compete with skilled 
workmen ? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences ? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 289 

2. Do you believe that scientific management puts a premium 

on muscle and speed rather than on brain? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

3. Do you believe that scientific management tends to deprive 

the worker of thought, judgment and initiative in con- 
nection with the work? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

4. Do you believe that scientific management tends to mini- 

mize the acquired skill of the workers? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences ? 

5. Do you believe that scientific management tends to destroy 

the craftsmanship and skill of the workers? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences ? 

6. Do you believe that scientific management tends to 

deprive the workers of the opportunity of learning a 
trade? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief ? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

7. Do you believe that scientific management deprives the 

worker of industrial and mechanical training? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

8. Do you believe that scientific management reduces the 

worker to a semi-automatic attachment to the machine 
or tools? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief ? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

9. Do you believe that scientific management narrows the 

scope, increases the monotony of the work, and prac- 



290 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

tically condemns the worker to a fixed monotonous rou- 
tine ? 

a. What grounds have you for this hehef ? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 
ID. Do you believe that scientific management decreases the 
general and the long-time efficiency of the workers? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

11. Do you believe that scientific management narrows the 

industrial capacity of the worker? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

12. Do you believe that scientific management narrows the 

worker's field of industrial and competitive activity? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

13. Do you believe that scientific management deprives the 

worker of the hope of advancement? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

14. Do you believe that scientific management tends to de- 

stroy the individuality of the worker? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

15. Do you believe that scientific management tends to de- 

stroy the initiative of the worker? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

16. Do you believe that scientific management destroys the 

worker's joy and pride in his work? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 291 

17. Do you believe that scientific management destroys the 

worker's sense of achievement? 
a. What grounds have you for this beHef ? 
h. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 
labor experiences? 

18. Do you believe that scientific management tends to de- 

stroy the worker's independence ? 
a. What grounds have you for this belief? 
h. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 
labor experiences ? 

19. Do you believe that scientific management tends to de- 

stroy the worker's dignity and manhood? 
a. What grounds have you for this belief? 
h. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 
labor experiences ? 

20. Do you believe that scientific management tends to de- 

stroy the worker's ambition? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

21. Do you believe that scientific management tends to sup- 

press and destroy the worker's inventive genius? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

22. Do you believe that scientific management overstrains 

and overfatigues the workers nervously and phys- 
ically ? 

d. What grounds have you for this belief ? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 
labor experiences ? 

23. Do you believe that scientific management represses and 

dwarfs the workers intellectually? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

24. Do you believe that scientific management tends to under- 

mine the worker's health, and bring premature old age 
upon the worker? 
a. What' grounds have you for this belief? 



292 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 
labor experiences? 

25. Do you believe that scientific management increases the 

danger of industrial accidents? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

26. Do you believe that scientific management tends to create 

suspicion of the management in the minds of workers? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 
2y. Do you believe that scientific management tends to de- 
velop suspicion of foremen in the minds of the workers ? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

28. Do you believe that scientific management tends to create 

mutual suspicion among workers? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

29. Have there been any methods in use in this establish- 

ment for stimulating competition in skill or output be- 
tween groups of workmen or sections or departments of 
the shop? If so, what and when? 

30. Do you believe that scientific management introduces the 

"contest principle" among the workmen? 

a. What grounds have you for this belief? 

b. What proofs can you present from your knowledge of 

labor experiences? 

31. Do you believe that the "contest principle" among work- 

men is advantageous 

a. To the employer? 

b. To the employee? 

c. Does it tend to improve the quality of the work? 

d. Does it tend to make inspection of work more accurate 

and painstaking? 

e. Does it tend to make each individual workman more 

ambitious? If so, why? If not, why not? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 293 

SCHEDULE VIII 
Collective Bargaining and Trade Unionism 

1. What is your understanding of the term "collective bar- 

gaining" ? 

2. Does collective bargaining imply that there are no under^ 

lying and guiding facts, natural laws or principles upon 
which both parties to the bargain are agreed? If so, 
why? 

3. Can true industrial democracy exist apart from free agents 

entering into voluntary agreements? 

4. Is, then, industrial democracy impossible where scientific 

facts and natural laws are concerned? 

5. If there can be no collective bargaining where scientific 

facts and natural laws are concerned, can there be indi- 
vidual bargaining under such circumstances? 

6. Is it possible to acquire sufficient scientific data to form 

a complete basis for the relations between two indi- 
viduals ? 

a. To what extent, and in what fields has scientific man- 

agement acquired these data? In other words, to 
what extent has the system of scientific fact and law, 
aimed at by scientific management, actually been 
worked out? 

b. Has it been worked out sufficiently to safeguard ab- 

solutely the individual bargainer from injustice? If 
not, is there any present justification for the re- 
fusal to sanction collective bargaining on the ground 
that there can be no bargaining about scientific fact 
and natural law? 

7. Does the management of this establishment, as a result 

of its experience, believe that the principles of scientific 
management are opposed to agreements with workers 
associated for that purpose? If so, why? 

8. Does scientific management make collective bargain- 

ing unnecessary as a protection to the workers? If 
so, why? 

9. Does scientific management make trade unionism and trade 



294 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR- 

union regulations unnecessary as a protection to the 
workers? If so, why? 

10. Does the management believe that agreements with or- 

ganized workers, covering the terms of employment, 
would interfere with or prevent the full development 
and application of scientific management in the plant? 
If so, why? 

11. Does the management believe that agreements with or- 

ganized workers would interfere with the form of dis- 
cipline and methods of direction required under scien- 
tific management? If so, in what manner, and to what 
extent ? 

12. Are there any verbal or written agreements in this estab- 

lishment relative to the terms of employment between 
the management and the employees? 

a. Verbal. 

b. Written. 

c. If so, what period of time do they cover? 

13. If agreements covering the terms of employment exist, 

with whom were they entered into? 

a. With the employees as individuals? 

b. With the employees as craft or trade groups? 

c. With the employees by departments? 

d. With the employee^ as a whole ? 

14. Has this establishment entered into any collective agree- 

ments with 

a. Union or unions? If so, 

I. With what union or unions? 

b. Just what circumstances led or determined the man- 

agement to enter into the agreement or agree- 
ments ? 

c. Have the results been satisfactory or unsatisfactory to 

the management? How and why? 

15. Were these agreements entered into as a result of con- 

ferences with the employees? 

a. Were the employees members of an industrial organiza- 

tion or trade union? 

b. If so, did officers of the local union, not employees, 

participate in the conferences which preceded the 
agreement ? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 295 

c. Did oflficers of the national unions with which em- 

ployees were affiliated, participate in such conferences ? 

d. Was the local trade union a party to the agreement? 

e. Was the national union a party to the agreement? 

16. Does the management believe that trade agreements, 

covering the terms of employment, can be entered into 
with employees acting collectively, with beneficial results 
to the management? If so, why? If not, why not? 

17. Can such collective agreements be entered into with un- 

organized employees, with safety to the management ? 
o. If so, why? 
h. If not, why not? 

18. Can such collective agreements be entered into with or- 

ganized employees, with safety to the management? If 
not, why not? 

19. Can such collective agreements be entered into with safety, 

through the national union of the employees? If not, 
why not? 

20. Can such collective agreements be entered into with safety 

through the national union of the employees? If not, 
why not? 

21. If agreements with employees, covering the terms of em- 

ployment, are advisable, which form is the most advan- 
tageous ? 

a. With employees as individuals? If so, why? 

h. With employees by craft or trade groups? If so, why? 

c. With employees by departments? If so, why? 

d. With the employees as a whole? If so, why? 

e. With the employees, including their local union? 

I. If not, why not? 
/. With the employees, including their national unions? 
I. If not, why not? 

22. Would an agreement with the employees establishing a 

basic or minimum wage rate be compatible with scien- 
tific management, efficiency and economy? If not, why 
not? 

23. Would a form of agreement covering terms of employ- 

ment entered into with employees covering wages for 
labor performed, and providing for a reduction or an 
advance in the wages paid for specific work, accord- 



296 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

ing to the condition of the labor market, the market 
price of the finished product, or the cost of living, be 
incompatible with scientific management, efficiency and 
economy? If so, why? If not, why not? 

24. Would there be anything incompatible with scientific man- 

agement, efficiency or economy, where an agreement 
exists with employees covering payment for labor, to 
have such agreement, when renewed, provide for a lower 
or a higher scale of compensation, bonus or premium? 
If so, why? If not, why not? 

25. Would there be anything incompatible with scientific man- 

agement, efficiency or economy in having a collective 

agreement with employees, 
a. Which would determine and regulate the basic wage, 
or hourly rate, the method of payment, the extent 
or amount of the task or 100 per cent, of accom- 
plishment, the piece rates, differential piece rates, 
bonus rates or premium rates? If so, why? 
h. Which would determine and regulate the method of 
making time studies and setting tasks or units of 
work thereon, e. g., the conditions under which time 
studies are made, the mode of selecting workers to 
be timed, the mode of determining which particular 
readings shall be considered the correct time, the 
allowance for the human element and machine fac- 
tors, etc.? If so, why? 

c. Which would determine and regulate the hours of labor ? 

If so, why? 

d. Which would determine the number of apprentices to 

be employed to the number of journeymen at work? 
If so, why? 

e. Which would regulate the system of craft or trade 

education to be given apprentices during their period 
of apprenticeship? If so, why? 

/. Which would provide for payment to workers when 
idle during working hours through causes for which 
the management was responsible? If so, why? 

g. Which would provide for payment above regular rates 
for work performed outside of the regular and cus- 
tomary hours of labor? If so, why? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 297 

h. Which would enable a discharged workman to have 
his case referred to a committee of employees for 
investigation, and then for conference with the man- 
agement? If so, why? 

i. Which would establish seniority rights for the em- 
ployees in each department under which promotion 
or advancement by seniority would prevail? If so, 
why? 

/. Which would provide for the employment of union 
workers? If so, why? 

k. Which would provide for what is termed the prefer- 
ential shop? If so, why? 

I. Which would provide for the employment of members 
of trade unions only? If so, why? 

m. Which would provide for the acceptance and recog- 
nition by the management of a shop steward or busi- 
ness agent of a trade union, as a representative of 
the organized employees, the duty of such representa- 
tive being: 

1. To advise with employees in all matters affecting 

their terms of employment. 

2. To carry out such instructions as might be given 

to him by the employees. 

3. To investigate all complaints made by employees 

to him relative to any conditions or terms of 
employment. 

4. To interview the management or the agents of 

the management in connection with such com- 
plaints in an effort to effect an adjustment of 
the dispute, or the removal of the cause for 
complaint. 

5. To act as the agent of the employees to the 

same degree and extent as the management 
does for the stockholders, employing company 
or corporation. 
If so, why, in each case? 
26. In so far as trade unionism has existed among the men 
in this establishment, what effects has it had 
a. Upon the attitude of the workers toward scientific man- 
agement ? 



298 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

b. Upon the willingness of the workers to cooperate with 

the management in spirit and in practice in general? 

c. Upon the discipline of the shop and respect for au- 

thority ? 

d. Upon the efificiency of the workers? 

e. Upon further relations with unions? 

/. Upon the willingness of the workers to cooperate with 
the management in meeting emergencies? 

g. Upon the eagerness and ambition of the workers for 
training and advancement? 

27. What does the management of this establishment consider 

to be the legitimate and helpful functions of labor or- 
ganizations and of unionism? How would it have the 
workers organize? What would it have the union do 
and how would it have it carry on its legitimate work? 
In what matters and just how do you welcome the co- 
operation of workers? 

28. What does this management consider to be specifically the 

defects and evils of unionism as it, at present, exists, 
and why? 

29. To what policies and demands of unionism has the man- 

agement of this establishment definite objections, and 
why? 

SCHEDULE IX 

Cooperative Possibilities 

1. Would the management of this establishment consider it 

practicable to enter into collective agreements with the 
wage-workers of this establishment, or groups of such 
workers, for definite periods, governing: 

a. Wages and their determination? 

b. The method or methods of payment? 

c. Time and motion study? 

d. General shop conditions and conditions of employment? 

I. If not, in each case, why not? 

2. Would the management of this establishment consider it 

practicable to enter into collective agreements with the 
wage-workers of this establishment through the local, 



QUESTIONNAIRE 299 

district or national unions to which the workers may be- 
long, for definite periods, governing: 

a. Wages and their determination? 

b. The method or methods of payment? 

c. Time and motion study? 

d. General shop conditions and conditions of employment? 

1. If not, in each case, why not? 

2. If so, in each case, on what general terms? 

If the management of this establishment considers it prac- 
ticable to enter into collective agreements either directly 
with its own employees, or with them through the local, 
district, or national unions to which the workers belong, 
which of the following matters does it consider 
practicable to have determined by collective agree- 
ments : 

a. What shall be the hours of labor? 

b. What shall be the basic or minimum wage rate? 

c. What shall be the number of apprentices employed? 

d. What shall be the form of shop education to be given 

apprentices ? 

e. What payment in addition to the regular rates shall be 

paid for all labor performed outside of the regular 
working hours? 

1. Week days? 

2. Sundays and legal holidays ? 

/. What payment shall be made for all idle time during 
working hours for which the management is respon- 
sible ? For spoiled work, bad materials and any other 
causes of loss of time or imperfect products for which 
the worker is not responsible? 

g. What rules shall exist regulating promotion or advance- 
ment according to the workmen's seniority? 

h. The extent to which workmen shall have a voice in 
determining the accuracy of time and motion studies 

1. As individuals? 

2. As a committee representing the employees in the 

department ? 

3. As a committee representing the employees as 

a whole? 

4. Through the local officers of their trade union? 



300 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

5. Through the national officers of their trade 
union? 
i. The determination of the basic wages ? 

/. The determination of the piece rates, the bonus 
rates, differential piece rates or premium rates to be 
paid? 

k. The determination of the amount of the task which shall 
entitle a worker to a bonus or a higher differential 
piece rate? 

/. The determination of the efficiency scale and the per- 
centage of efficiency at which the payment of a pre- 
mium shall begin? 

m. The form and severity of discipline including fines and 
suspensions ? 

n. The privilege of discharged workmen to submit their 
cases to a committee of the employees, appointed by 
them for this purpose? 

o. The privilege of an employee to present any complaint 
which he may have against any agent of the man- 
agement to a committee of the employees, appointed 
by them for this purpose ? 

p. The provisions under which such committee of the 
employees shall present such matters to the man- 
agement ? 

q. The amount of remuneration which shall be paid a dis- 
charged employee should it be found that his discharge 
was unwarranted? 

r. The method to be adopted, should a dispute arise rela- 
tive to the interpretation of any clause or clauses of 
the agreement? 

s. The alternative employment of workmen during times 
of business depression instead of the discharge of a 
number of employees? 

I. In each case, if not, why not? 

4. Are there any other matters in this connection which the 

management of this plant considers practicable to be de- 
termined by collective agreement? 

5. In the opinion of the management of this establishment, 

how far should such an agreement go in fixing the de- 
tails of the terms and conditions of employment? 



QUESTIONNAIRE 301 

a. As covered by an agreement with a national union? 

h. As covering special local conditions? 

If the management of this establishment considers it prac- 
ticable to enter into collective agreement, either directly 
with its employees, or with them through the local, dis- 
trict or national unions to which the workers may be- 
long, which of the following rnethods of interpretation 
of the specific terms of the agreement, and determina- 
tion as to whether they are being obeyed, does it con- 
sider practicable to accept as a part of such an agree- 
. ment : 

a. The decisions of professional experts appointed and paid 
by the employers, employees, or both ? 

h. Arbitration under which a third disinterested party has 
the deciding voice? 

c. Reference to the officers of an employers' association 

and the national officers of the trade unions affected? 

d. Reference to a joint committee of equal numbers rep- 

resenting the management and the employees ? 

e. Reference to a joint committee on which are equal num- 

bers representing the management and the employees 
together with a professional and compensated individ- 
ual having a deciding voice ? 
What possible methods for the interpretation of the specific 
terms of the agreement and determination as to whether 
they are being obeyed has the management itself to 
suggest ? 
If the management of this establishment considers it prac- 
ticable to enter into collective agreement either directly 
with its employees, or with them through the local, dis- 
trict, or national unions to which the workers may belong, 
which of the following methods for the settlement of 
disputes between the management and the workers or 
their representatives, and for the enforcement of the 
agreement, does it consider practicable to accept as a 
part of such an agreement? 
a. Arbitration, under which a third disinterested party 

has the deciding voice? 
h. Reference to the officers of an employers' association 
and the national officers of the trade unions affected? 



302 SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT AND LABOR 

c. Reference to a joint committee of equal numbers rep- 

resenting the management and the employees? 

d. Reference to a joint committee on which are equal num- 

bers representing the management and the employees 
together with a professional and compensated indi- 
vidual having a deciding voice? 
9. What possible methods for the settlement of disputes be- 
tween the management and the workers, and for the 
enforcement of the terms of the agreement, has the 
management itself to suggest? 

10. Is the management of this establishment familiar with the 

terms and workings of the protocols of the New York 
clothing trades? If so, does it see a possible solution 
of the problem of cooperation between scientific man- 
agement and organized labor in the characteristic pro- 
visions and methods of operation of these protocols ? 

a. If so, why? 

&. If not, why not? 

11. What general and specific features of scientific manage- 

ment do the members of organized labor consider fea- 
sible or practicable of acceptance, supposing the prin- 
ciple of collective bargaining to be granted? 

12. Do the members of organized labor see a possible solu- 

tion of the problem of cooperation between scientific 
management and organized labor in the characteristic 
provisions and methods of operation of the New York 
protocols? If not, why not? 

13. Would the management of this establishment be willing to 

have differences between itself and its employees set- 
tled by arbitration? 
a. Through an arbitrator or a board of arbitration jointly 

appointed ? 
h. Through a board of arbitration, the odd member of 
which should be a government appointee? 



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